great post was re candida yeast bloom very long great post martin very informative well balanced and humanitarian without neglecting the need for scientific rigor cross posted to alt psychology personality since some personality typing will be discussed at the beginning note i ve set all followups to sci med since most of my comments are more sci med oriented and i m sure most of the replies if any will be med related in article banschbach vms ocom okstate edu writes i can not believe the way this thread on candida yeast has progressed steve dyer and i have been exchanging words over the same topic in sci med nutrition when he displayed his typical reserve and attacked a woman poster for being treated by a licenced physician for a disease that did not exist calling this physician a quack was reprehensible steve and i see that you and some of the others are doing it here as well they are just responding in their natural way hyper choleric syndrome hcs oops that is not a recognized illness in the psychological community better not say that since it therefore must not and never will exist actually it is fascinating that a disproportionate number of physicians will type out as nt for those not familiar with the myers briggs system just e mail me and i ll send a summary file to you in the general population nt s comprise only about of the population but among physicians it is much much higher i don t know the exact percentage any help here a p p er s one driving characteristic of an nt especially an ntj is their obvious choleric behavior driver type a etc the extreme emotional need to control to lead and or to be the best or the most competent if they are also extroverted they are best described as field marshalls this trait is very valuable and essential in our society we need people who want to lead to strive to overcome the elements to seek and thirst for knowledge to raise the level of competency etc the great successes in science and technology are in large part due to the vision an n trait and scientifically minded approach t trait of the nt personality of course the other types and temperaments have their own positive contributions as well however when the nt person has self image challenges the dark side of this personality type usually comes out which should be obvious to all a physician who is a strong nt and who has not learned to temper their temperament will be extremely business like lack of empathy or feeling and is very compelled to have total control over their patient the patient must be obedient to their diagnosis and prescription without question i ve known many m d s of this temperament and suffice to say i don t oblige them with a followup visit no matter how competent i think they are and they usually are very competent from a knowledge viewpoint since that is an extreme drive of theirs to know the most to know it all maybe we need more nf doctor s enough on this subject let s move on to candida bloom let me tell you who the quacks really are these are the physicans who have no idea how the human body interacts with it s environment and how that balance can be altered by diet and antibiotics could it just be professional jealousy i couldn t help elaine or jon but somebody else did you ve helped me already by your post of course i believe that i have been misdiagnosed on the net as suffering from anal retentivitis but being the phlegmatic i am maybe i was just a little too harsh on a few people myself in past posts let s all try to raise the level of this discussion above the level of anal effluent humans have all kinds of different organisms living in the gi system mouth stomach small and large intestine sinuses vagina and on the skin these are nonpathogenic because they do not cause disease in people unless the immune system is compromised they are also called nonpathogens because unlike the pathogenic organisms that cause human disease they do not produce toxins as they live out their merry existence in and on our body but any of these organisms will be considered pathogenic if it manages to take up residence within the body a poor mucus membrane barrier can let this happen and vitamin a is mainly responsible for setting up this barrier in my well described situation in prior posts i definitely was immune stressed blood tests showed my vitamin a levels were very low my sinuses were a mess no doubt the mucosal lining and the cilia were heavily damaged i also was on antibiotics times in years in the end even two weeks of ceftin did not work and i had confirmed diagnoses of a chronic bacterial infection of the sinuses via cat scans mucus color won t get into the details and other symptoms three very traditional ent s made this diagnosis i did not have any cultures done however because of the difficulty of doing this right and because my other symptoms clearly showed a bacterial infection enough of this background provided to help you understand where i was when i make comments about my sporanox anti fungal therapy below the first question i have is this can fungus penetrate a little way into poor mucus membrane tissue maybe via hyphae thus causing symptoms without being considered systemic in the classic sense it is sort of an inbetween infection steve got real upset with elaine s doctor because he was using anti fungals and vitamin a for her gi problems if steve really understoood what vitamin a does in the body he would not or at least should not be calling elaine s doctor a quack i was concerned too because of the toxicity of vitamin a my doctor after my blood tests put me on iu of vitamin a for one week only then dropped it down to iu for the next couple of weeks i also received zinc and other supplementation since all of these interrelate in fairly complex ways as my doctor explained he s one of those evil orthomolecular specialists i had a blood test three weeks later and vitamin a was normal he then stopped me on all vitamin a except for some in a multi vitamin supplement and made sure that i maintain a iu day of beta carotene call me carrot face hopefully elaine s doctor will take a similar careful approach and to all supplements i m even reevaluating some supplements i m taking for example niacin in fairly large dosages gram day which steve dyer had good information about on sci med nutrition if niacin only has second order improvement in symptomatic relief of my sinus allergies then it probably is not worth taking such a large dose long term and risking liver damage survives if it gets access to a lot of glucose it blooms and over rides the other organisms living with it in the sinuses gi tract or vagina in though i do now believe based on my successful therapy with sporanox that i definitely had some excessive growth of fungus unknown species in my sinuses i still want to ask the question have there been any studies that demonstrate candida blooms in the sinuses with associated sinus irritation sinusitis rhinitis my sinus irritation reduced significantly after one week of sporanox and no other new treatments were implemented during this time i did not have any noticeable gi track problems before starting on sporanox but some for a few days after which then went away considered normal btw my doctor dug out one of his medical reference books sorry can t remember which one and found an obscure comment dating back into the s which stated that people can develop contained non lethal or non serious aspergillis infestations aspergiliosis of the sinuses leading to sinus inflammation symptoms i ll have to dig out that reference again since it is relevant to this discussion some people do really develop a bad inflammatory process at the mucus membrane or skin bloom site whether this is an allergic like reaction to the candida or not isn t certain my doctor tested me i believe a rast or rast similar test for allergic response to specificially candida albicans and i showed a strong positive another question would everybody show the same strong positive so this test is essentially useless and assuming it is true that candida can grow part way into the mucus membrane tissue and the concentration exceeds a threshold amount could not a person who tests as having an allergy to candida definitely develop allergic symptoms such as mucus membrane irritation due to the body s allergic response as i said in an earlier post one does not need to be a rocket scientist or have a m d degree or a ph d in biochemistry to see the plausibility of this hypothesis btw and i ll repost this again dr ivker in his book sinus survival has routinely given before anything else nizoral a pre sporanox systemic anti fungal not as safe and not as good as sporanox to his new chronic sinusitis patients if they have been on antibiotics four or more times in the last two years he claims that out of or so patients well over notice some relief of sinus inflammation and other symptoms but it doesn t cure it by any means implying the so called yeast fungus infection is not the primary cause but a later complication he s also found that nystatin whether taken internally or put into a sinus spray does not help this implies of course assuming that excessive yeast fungus bloom is aggravating the sinus inflammation that the yeast fungus has grown partway into the tissue since nystatin will not kill yeast fungus other than by direct contact it is not absorbed into the blood stream again i admit lots of ifs and implies which doesn t please the hard core nt who has to have the double blind study or it s a non issue but one has to start with some plausible hypothesis explanation a strawman if you will if it s internal only symptoms can be used and these symptoms are pretty nondescript this brings up an interesting observation used by those who will deny and reject any and all aspects of the yeast hypothesis until the appropriate studies are done and that is if you can t observe or culture the yeast bloom in the gut or sinus then there s no way to diagnose or even recognize the disease and i know they realize that it is virtually impossible to test for candida overbloom in any part of the body that cannot be easily observed since candida is everywhere in the body it s a real catch another catch those who totally reject the yeast hypothesis say that no studies have been done actually studies have been done but if it s not up to a certain standard then it is from their perspective a non study which should not even be considered i agree that the appropriate studies should be done and that will take big to do it right however in order to convince the funding agencies in these austere times to open their wallets you literally have to give them evidence and the only acceptable evidence to compete with other proposals is paradoxically to do almost the exact study needed funding that is you have to do of the study before you even get funding as a scientist at a national lab i m very aware of this for the smaller funded projects i m afraid that even if dr ivker and other doctors got together pooled their practice s case histories and anecdotes into a compelling picture and approach the funding agencies they would get nowhere even if they were able to publish their statistical results it is obvious from the comments by some of the doctors here is that they have decided excessive yeast colonization in the gut or sinuses leading to noticeable non lethal symptoms does not exist and is not even a tenable hypothesis so any amount of case histories or compiled anecdotal evidence to the contrary will never change their mind and not only that they would also oppose the needed studies because in their minds it s a done issue excessive yeast growth leading to diffuse allergic symptoms does not will not and cannot exist period kind of tough to dialog with those who hold such a viewpoint kind of reminds me of lister candida is kept in check in most people by the normal bacterial flora in the sinuses the gi tract mouth stomach and intestines and in the vaginal tract which compete with it for food the human immune system ususally does not bother itself with these nonpathogenic organisms unless they broach the mucus membrane barrier if they do an inflammatory response will be set up most americans are not getting enough vitamin a from their diets about of all american s die with less vitamin a than they were born with u s autopsy studies while this low level of vitamin a does not cause pathology blindness it does impair the mucus membrane barrier system this would then be a predisposing factor for a strong inflammatory response after a candida bloom aren t there also other nutrients necessary to the proper working of the sinus mucus membranes and cilia while diabetics can suffer from a candida bloom the most common cause of this type of bloom is the use of broad spectrum antibiotics which knock down many different kinds of bacteria in the body and remove the main competition for candida as far as food is concerned while drugs are available to handle candida many patients find that their doctor will not use them unless there is evidence of a systemic infection the toxicity of the anti fungal drugs does warrant some caution but if the gi or sinus inflammation is suspected to be candida and recent use of a broad spectrum antibiotic is the smoking gun then anti fungal use should be approrpriate just as the anti fungal creams are an appropriate treatment for recurring vaginal yeast infections in spite of what mr steve dyer says again the evidence from mycological studies indicate that many yeast fungus species can grow hyphae roots into deep tissue similar to mold growing in bread you can continue to kill the surface such as nystatin does but you can t kill that which is deeper in the tissue without using a systemic anti fungal such as itraconazole sporanox or some of the older ones such as nizoral which are more toxic and not as effective this is why as has been pointed out by recent studies sent to me by a doctor i ve been in e mail contact with thanks that nystatin is not effective in the long term treatment of gi tract candidiasis it s like trying to weed a garden by cutting off what s above the ground but leaving the roots ready to come out again once you walk away the question is whether a contained candida bloom can partially grow into tissue through the mucus membranes causing some types of symptoms in susceptible people e g allergy without becoming systemic in the classical sense of the word something in between strictly an excessive bloom not causing any problems and the full blown systemic infection that is potentially lethal in the gi system the ano rectal region seems to be a particularly good reservoir for candida and the use of pantyhose by many women creates a very favorable environment around the rectum for transfer through moisture and humidity of candida to the vaginal tract one of the most effctive ways to minimmize this transfer is to wear undyed cotton underwear also if one is an anal retentive like i ve been diagnosed in a prior post that can also provide more sites for excessive candida growth if the bloom occurs in the anal area the burning swelling pain and even blood discharge make many patients think that they have hemorroids if the bloom manages to move further up the gi tract very diffuse symptomatology occurs abdominal discomfort and blood in the stool this positive stool for occult blood is what sent elaine to her family doctor in the first place after extensive testing he told her that there was nothing wrong but her gut still hurt on to another doctor and so on richard kaplan has told me throiugh e mail that he considers occult blood tests in stool specimens to be a waste of time and money because of the very large number of false positives candida blooms guys if my gut hurt me on a constant basis i would want it fixed yes it s nice to know that i don t have colon cancer but what then is causing my distress when i finally find a doctor who treats me and gets me better steve dyer calls him a quack as i ve said in private e mail there are flaws in our current medical system that make it difficult or even impossible for a physician to attempt alternative therapies after the approved proven accepted therapies don t work for example i went to three ent s who all said that i will just have to live with my acute chronic sinusitis after the ab s failed they did mention surgery to open up the ostia but my ostia weren t plugged and it would not get to the root cause of my condition after three months of aggressive and fairly non standard therapy sporanox body nutrient level monitoring and equalization vitamin c lentinen echinacea etc my health has vastly improved to where i was two years ago before my health greatly deteriorated of course skeptics would say that maybe if i did nothing i would have improved anyway but that view is stretching things quite far because of the experience of the three ent s i saw who said that i d just have to live with it i m confident i will reach what one could call a total cure the anti fungal program i undertook was one necessary step in that direction because of my overuse of ab s for the last four years note for those having sinus problems may i suggest the book by dr ivker i mention above be sure to get the revised edition i have often wondered what an m d with chronic gi distress or sinus problems would do about the problem that he tells his patients is a non existent syndrome dr ivker started off having chronic and severe sinus problems and his visits to several ent s totally floored him when they said you ll just have to live with it he spent several years trying everything standard and non standard until he was essentially cured of chronic sinusitis he now shares his approach in his book and i can honestly say that i am on the road to recovery following some parts of it his one recommendation to take a systemic anti fungal at the beginning of treatment if you have a history of anti biotic overuse has been proven to him time and time again in his own practice i m sure if i commented to him of the hard core beliefs of the anti yeast hypothesis posters that he would have definite things to say such as it s worked wonders for me in almost two thousand cases to put it mildly i also would not be surprised if he would say that they are the ones violating their moral obligations to help the patient maybe those doctors who are reading this who have a practice and are confronted by a patient having symptoms that could be due to the hypothetical yeast overgrowth e g they fit some of the profiles the pro yeast people have identified should consider anti fungal therapy if all other avenues have been exhausted remember theory and practice are two different things you cannot have one without the other they are synergistic if a doctor does something non standard yet produces noticeable symptomatic relief in over a thousand of his patients shouldn t you at least sit up and take notice maybe you ought to trust what he says and begin hypothesizing why it works instead of why it shouldn t work i m afraid a lot of doctors have become so enamored with scientific correctness that they are ignoring the patients they have sworn to help you have to do both both have to be balanced which we don t see from some of the posters to this group there comes a point when you just have to use a little common sense and maybe an empirical approach such as trying a good systemic anti fungal such as sporanox after having exhausted all the other avenues i was one of those who the traditional medical establishment was not able to help so i did the natural thing i went to a couple of doctor s who are somewhat outside this establishment and as a result i have found significant relief would it not be better if the traditional medical establishment can set up some kind of mechanism where any doctor without fear of being sued or having his license pulled can try experimental and unproven beyond a doubt therapies for his her patients that finally reach the point where all the accepted therapies are ineffective i d like to hear a doctor tell me well i ve tried all the therapies that are approved and accepted in this country and since they clearly don t work for you i now have the authority to use experimental unproven techniques that seem to have helped others i can t promise anything and there are some risks you will have to sign something saying you understand the experimental and possibly risky nature of these unproven therapies and i ll have to register your case at the state board anyway if my ent had suggested this to me i would ve jumped on this pronto instead of going to one of those doctors who for either altruistic reasons or for greed is practicing these alternative therapies with much risk to him her risk meaning losing their license and possibly to the patient such a mechanism would keep control in the more mainstream medicine and also provide valuable data that would essentially be free it also would be morally and ethically better than the current system by showing the compassion of the medical community to the patient that it s doing everything it can within reason to help the patient it is the lack of such a mechanism that is leading large numbers of people to try alternative therapies some of which seem to work like my case and others of which will never work at all true quackery i better get off my soapbox before this post reaches k in size if taken orally it can also become a major bacteria in the gut through aresol sprays it has also been used to innoculate the sinus membranes but before this innoculation occurs the mucus membrane barrier system needs to be strengthened this is accomplished by vitamin a vitamin c and some of the b complex vitamins diet surveys repeatedly show that americans are not getting enough b and folate these are probably the segement of the population that will have the greatest problem with this non existent disorder candida blooms after antibiotic therapy what dosage of b appears to be necessary to promote the healing and proper working of the mucos memebranes some of the above material was obtained from natural healing by mark bricklin published by rodale press as well as notes from my human nutrition course i will be posting a discussion of vitamin a sometime in the future along with reference citings to point out the extremely important role that vitamin a plays in the mucus membrane defense system in the body and why vitamin a should be effective in dealing with candida blooms another effective dietary treatment is to restrict carbohydrate intake during the treatment phase this is especially important if the gi system is involved if candida can not get glucose it s not going to out grow the bacteria and you then give bacteria which can use amino acids and fatty acids for energy a chance to take over and keep the candida in check once carbohydrate is returned to the gut i d like to see the role of complex carbohydrates such as starch if steve and some of the other nay sayers want to jump all over this post fine i jumped all over steve in sci med nutrition because he verbably accosted a poster who was seeking advice about her doctor s use of vitamin a and anti fungals for a candida bloom in her gut people seeking advice from newsnet should not be treated this way those of us giving of our time and knowledge can slug it out to our heart s content if you saved your venom for me steve and left the helpless posters who are timidly seeking help alone i wouldn t have a problem with your behavior brave soul you are the venom on usenet can be quite toxic unless one develops an immunity to it one year ago my phlegmatic self would have backed down right away from an attack of cholericitis but my immune system and my computer system have been hardened from gradual desensitization i now kind of like being called anal retentive it has a nice ring to it i also was very impressed by how it just flowed into the post truly classic worthy of a blue or maybe brown ribbon i might even cross post it to alt best of internet hmmm martin banschbach ph d professor of biochemistry and chairman department of biochemistry and microbiology osu college of osteopathic medicine thanks again for a great and informative post i hope others who have researched this area and are lurking in the background will post their thoughts as well no matter their views on this subject jon noring charter member infj club if you re dying to know what infj means be brave e mail me i ll send info jon noring noring netcom com jkn international ip fred s gourmet chocolate carlton place phone chips world s best livermore ca v mail who are you read alt psychology personality that s where the action is
