Low-dose naltrexone

[Guest guest]

Hello,

After 20 months taking 4.5 mg naltrexone due to low natural killer cell

function, I can report that I have not had any colds or flu during the 20 month

period. I'm one of those that usually picks up every flu that goes around, so

I'm happy that I do not have to go through the long recovery time after having

the flu. This particular treatment was found by a Dr. Bernard Bihari.

See information and web site under my signature line. People often start at

3 mg for a couple months and then move up to 4.5 mg. This is a physician

prescribed medicine. So far, my HMO won't cover it. I get it from a

compounding pharmacy. One capsule is taken after 9 p.m. at night.

Du Pre

Website: http://www.angelfire.com/jazz/isaiah40soaringeagle/index.html

or http://webs.lanset.com/isaiah43/

" By words the mind is winged. " Aristophanes

LDN boosts the immune system, activating the body's own natural defenses.

Up to the present time, the question of " What controls the immune system? " has

not been present in the curricula of medical colleges and the issue has not

formed a part of the received wisdom of practicing physicians. Nonetheless, a

body of research over the past two decades has pointed repeatedly to one's own

endorphin secretions (our internal opioids) as playing the central role in the

beneficial orchestration of the immune system, and recognition of the facts is

growing.

Witness these statements from a recent review article of medical progress in the

November 13, 2003 issue of the prestigious New England Journal of Medicine:

" Opioid-Induced Immune Modulation: .... Preclinical evidence indicates

overwhelmingly that opioids alter the development, differentiation, and function

of immune cells, and that both innate and adaptive systems are affected.1,2 Bone

marrow progenitor cells, macrophages, natural killer cells, immature thymocytes

and T cells, and B cells are all involved. The relatively recent identification

of opioid-related receptors on immune cells makes it even more likely that

opioids have direct effects on the immune system.3 "

The brief blockade of opioid receptors between 2 a.m. and 4 a.m. that is caused

by taking LDN at bedtime each night is believed to produce a prolonged

up-regulation of vital elements of the immune system by causing an increase in

endorphin and enkephalin production. Normal volunteers who have taken LDN in

this fashion have been found to have much higher levels of beta-endorphins

circulating in their blood in the following days. Animal research by I. Zagon,

Ph.D., and his colleagues has shown a marked increase in metenkephalin levels as

well. [Note: Additional information for Dr. Zagon can be found at the end of

this page.]

Bihari says that his patients with HIV/AIDS who regularly took LDN before the

availability of HAART were generally spared any deterioration of their important

helper T cells (CD4+).

In human cancer, research by Zagon over many years has demonstrated inhibition

of a number of different human tumors in laboratory studies by using endorphins

and low dose naltrexone. It is suggested that the increased endorphin and

enkephalin levels, induced by LDN, work directly on the tumors' opioid receptors

- and, perhaps, induce cancer cell death (apoptosis). In addition, it is

believed that they act to increase natural killer cells and other healthy immune

defenses against cancer.

In general, in people with diseases that are partially or largely triggered by a

deficiency of endorphins (including cancer and autoimmune diseases), or are

accelerated by a deficiency of endorphins (such as HIV/AIDS), restoration of the

body's normal production of endorphins is the major therapeutic action of LDN.

http://www.low dose naltrexone.org/