Disulfiram for persistent forms of Borrelia burgdorferi

paolo

paolo

Senior Member
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I have recently watched a conference about Lyme disease held in October at Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai (New York). During the conference, prof. Kim Lewis (Northeastern University) talked about the persistent phenotype of Borrelia burgdorferi as a possible cause for at least some cases of post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome (PTLDS). He mentioned a drug (disulfiram) as a possible treatment for this condition. Disulfiram has been studied for Lyme disease only in vitro, so far (Pothineni V et al. 2016), but Kim Lewis mentioned a trial on the animal model of Lyme borreliosis, which is ongoing. You can follow his lecture in this video (from 39:00) and in this one (from 7:00). It is currently unknown how disulfiram exerts its action on Borrelia burgdorferi, but we know that in vitro it is able to kill persistent forms.

My question is: has any of you tried this drug? It is curently used against alcoholism, as it is an inhibitor of the enzyme acetaldehyde dehydrogenase and thus it lets acetaldehyde build up, if you drink any alcohol, leading to unpleasent consequences.
 
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aquariusgirl

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This thread is a couple of years old, but the drug seems to be getting some traction in the lyme community based on Dr Liegner's experience.

.https://madisonarealymesupportgroup...ough-drug-for-lyme-other-tick-borne-diseases/

The feedback so far is anecdotal, and while Dr Liegner's early patients seem to be clear cut cases of Lyme, it's apparent from social media that some of the folks using the drug now would describe themselves as CFS/ME patients.

The reason I'm posting is because I hope some of the biochemistry majors can help me figure something out.

A few of the folks on the drug say that it has restored their cognitive abilities to pre-illness levels in just a matter of weeks....four or five in one case.

I can't imagine that killing pathogens would so quickly improve cognitive function, so I'm wondering if something else is going on?

And I'm wondering if it's related to its effect on copper and zinc in the brain?

This link suggests Disulfiram is metabolised to DDC diethyldithiocarbamate which is a copper antagonist.

https://link.springer.com/article/1...XStqFdmR8aS7AKQl5oO1YQMgFZsVkV6-qfCkA0hAdyWBI

Any thoughts?

@HTester: This has no apparent connection to your theory or work...but might be of interest, she said hopefully. Either way, I'd appreciate your opinion.
 
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Charles555nc

Senior Member
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573
Im on disulfiram. I started at a full tab and had an explosive amount of gas, orally and out the back end. Later on I had a really nasty nerve inflammations, so now 2 hours after I take, now a half tab, I take 100mg of alpha lipoic acid to detox it to avoid the nerve irritation later. Alot of gas, some increased energy, and the nerve irritation are the main things Ive noticed so far.

Ill report back when I up the dose to a full tab next week.
 
Aspie Lymie

Aspie Lymie

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27
Half a tab is a lot... Dr Kinderlehrer starts his patients on 62.5mg every 3 days and increases every 2 weeks to avoid serious herxes.
 
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duncan

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Messages
2,240
Oh, this is new territory. Everyone is winging it. Don't lose sight that it is based only on Leigner's 3-person study. Yes, Fallon in conjunction with the NIH is trialing it, but I don't expect any real results from that till second half of 2020. The best source of early patient feedback is the Lyme forums.
 
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Charles555nc

Senior Member
Messages
573
I took two 250mg tablets of Anabuse on Monday and really felt it in my brain (where most of my symptom are). Ive been on it for about 3 months, working up from a small, half pill dose once a week.

I think it would impossible for me to take Anabuse without taking 100mg alpha lipoic acid an hour after the medication and then another dose 4 hours after that. I get bad ear pain/tinnitus from Anabuse, and the alpha lipoic acid minimizes that toxicity.

I seem much more able to leave the house and do things I want to do after the Anabuse but Im also taking alot of other things.
 
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Charles555nc

Senior Member
Messages
573
Still doing Anabuse (alpha lipoic acid to detox), methylene blue for bartonella, japanase knotwood for bart, and Houttuynia Cordata (spelling?) for bart as well, and fenbendazole for parasites/worms/bart.

Making progress.
 
CedarHome

CedarHome

Senior Member
Messages
131
duncan said:
Oh, this is new territory. Everyone is winging it. Don't lose sight that it is based only on Leigner's 3-person study. Yes, Fallon in conjunction with the NIH is trialing it, but I don't expect any real results from that till second half of 2020. The best source of early patient feedback is the Lyme forums.
Click to expand...
Can you recommend a Lyme forum? (Nothing is as good as Phoenix Rising!)
 
beatsmyth

beatsmyth

Messages
94
Charles555nc said:
Still doing Anabuse (alpha lipoic acid to detox), methylene blue for bartonella, japanase knotwood for bart, and Houttuynia Cordata (spelling?) for bart as well, and fenbendazole for parasites/worms/bart.

Making progress.
Click to expand...
Check this out:

https://www.bayarealyme.org/blog/co...tarving-killing-bacteria-causes-lyme-disease/

The results of this new laboratory study show that loratadine (trade name: Claritin®) and specifically its metabolite, desloratadine, are able to prevent manganese (Mn) from entering the cell wall of the bacteria that causes Lyme disease, starving the bacteria and causing it to die in test tubes. The antihistamine accomplishes this by inhibiting the bacteria’s transport system, BmtA (Borrelia metal transporter A).
Click to expand...
 
JES

JES

Senior Member
Messages
1,372
beatsmyth said:
Check this out:

https://www.bayarealyme.org/blog/co...tarving-killing-bacteria-causes-lyme-disease/
Click to expand...

I remember reading about that result. As most of the clickbaity "disease X now has a cure" articles, it turned out too good to be true. The devil is in the details and almost all news articles of this finding omitted this somewhat relevant detail (which is actually described in the article itself):

Desloratadine exhibited potent borreliacidal activity in vitro at and above 78 μg/mL (250 μM). Currently, desloratadine is prescribed at 5–10 mg dose. A 250 μM dose would roughly translate into 400 mg/day. The mean plasma concentration of desloratadine in human blood after 5 mg or even up to 40 mg dose is about 2–5 ng/mL.40 Thus, achieving borreliacidal concentrations of desloratadine in blood are challenging and 250 μM concentration of desloratadine in vivo is physiologically irrelevant.
Click to expand...

So yeah, I suppose you could consume one hundred 5 mg desloratadine tablets and see what happens, but I wouldn't recommend it.
 
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