Depleting (XMRV-infected) B-cells as teatment

jenbooks

jenbooks

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1,270
I'd rather have gene therapy. They do it for weak EBV antigens in blood cancers and get significant remissions with no side effects nor are you suppressing the immune system. I wondered about this--how many bcells are infected if XMRV is an issue? Only 1% are infected in chronic EBV.
 
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Smulan

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43
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Stockholm
Perhaps the number of infected cells could be very different from person to person, in the same way I supose HIV is with great variations in viral load?

B-cell treatment wont compete with anitvirals I guess but it is a interesting study which supports that somthing like XMRV could be causing ME/CFS.
 
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perovyscus

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96
Most overlook this, but those patients were also on Methotrexate and some had autoimmune disorders. The study was a great idea, and the authors are great people. They wrote that the study unblinding will happen early next year, but I couldn't think of a worse study design for extrapolating to regular patients. Well, I could. (Monkey nurses with rabies fabricating data through sign language).

And I'm OK with this. The purpose of those doctors were to help their patients. It just so happened they thought they were onto something. Quite possible.

My list of stuff to try only has four things on it, and rituximab is at the bottom, but at least it's there. It's not exactly like trying foie gras. I would have to infuse it myself. I'm not sure you could find a physician in the US to even consider you a patient if this treatment was your long-term goal.

As for XMRV, everyone seems to know more about it than I do, but the Swedish authors do implicate viral lysis within B cells as a possible MOA.
 
Kati

Kati

Patient in training
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5,497
perovyscus said:
My list of stuff to try only has four things on it, and rituximab is at the bottom, but at least it's there. It's not exactly like trying foie gras. I would have to infuse it myself. I'm not sure you could find a physician in the US to even consider you a patient if this treatment was your long-term goal.

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I am not sure if it's a good idea to infuse it yourself. There are safety issues during the infusion, rates you need to administer the drug, and infusion reactions are quite common. I know because I am a chemo nurse. For instance, the first time infusion can take up to 8 hours due to the fact you have to introduce it very slowly at first and increase the rate every half hour, and then obeserve for 30 min after the end of the infusion. If there is a reaction, the ability to administer benadryl and other drugs is important and there can be other complications.

That would be kind of scary.


You'd also need follow up blood test to make sure you are safe to recieve the next dose. It's not a simple drug and its not cheap, but it worked wonders on our lymphoma patients.
 
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