Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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Jafa
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Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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Like most people on the forum I follow a lot of Bredesen’s protocol re supplements taking Theracurmin, resveratrol and omega 3’s, with the aim of suppressing overactive inflammation. Recently my family were ill with some sort of cold virus which gave them minor symptoms for a few days. However, when I caught what initially appeared to be the same virus I became much more unwell, was febrile for days, had absolutely no energy and was diagnosed by my GP with pneumonia. The prescribed antibiotics didn’t really make much difference for several days so it seems as though it was viral. It’s taken me a month to recover my energy levels and ability to exercise.

My CRP is normally <1 and was 92 while unwell, and my usual mild neutropaenia resolved, the count climbing from 1.2 to over 6. I’ve not yet repeated those bloods.

I’ve been pondering...is there a risk in biohacking the inflammatory response? What if you need those free radicals to wipe out the attacking pathogens? Might we risk losing a pitched battle while we endeavour to play the long game?
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slacker
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Re: Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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Interesting question. I suspect the answer is that no one knows. Immune suppressant treatments for rheumatoid arthritis and some cancers certainty increase risk for infection. These therapies are balancing benefits and risks. Are the combinations of anti inflammatory supplements we are taking strong enough to weaken our immune system rather than just calm down inflammation? Was your bad infection just bad luck of the draw? I too recently had a bad cold that took a long time to go away - it was not nearly as severe as yours and I never went to the doctor. However, I spoke with several other people in my community who had similar infections that seems to linger on.
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SusanJ
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Re: Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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Jafa wrote:I’ve been pondering...is there a risk in biohacking the inflammatory response? What if you need those free radicals to wipe out the attacking pathogens? Might we risk losing a pitched battle while we endeavour to play the long game?
I think slacker's analogy is an important one. We know what using the sledgehammer approach of the RA biologics will do to people: infections and cancer. My dad succumbed to pneumonia and had been on Remicade for several years. Did it play a role in his inability to fight pneumonia? There's no doubt it did.

And yes, there are concerns about too many antioxidants messing with free radicals that effect our immune cell signaling. I wrote about it a while back. Antioxidants, ROS, glucose metabolism, CAD and RA.

In the end, we all walk a fine line in any biohacking we do through supplements. Think we'll find over time there might be one dose for prevention and one dose for treatment for these types of supplements. Bredesen's experience has been in treating those with cognitive impairment, so we're just extrapolating at the moment for prevention. Personally, I've cut back on curcumin and fish oil over what I took a couple years ago and dropped some (like quercetin) as I've healed my gut and changed my diet.
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Re: Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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As I become "well", I plan to slowly cut back on as many supplements as possible. My FM MD supports this. The rub is determining what is "well!" :lol:
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Re: Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

Post by zc_hl »

Hi Jafa,

If you have some time, I would advise you to read about the Marshall pathogenesis hypothesis which is totally on topic: https://mpkb.org/home/patients/pathogenesis_overview

By the way, amyloid-β is an anti-microbial peptide (https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2950453 ... -evidence/):

"Recent evidence indicates a role for Aβ as an antimicrobial peptide (AMP), a class of innate immune defense molecule that utilizes fibrillation to protect the host from a wide range of infectious agents. In humans and in animal models, infection of the brain frequently leads to increased amyloidogenic processing of the amyloid-β protein precursor (AβPP) and resultant fibrillary aggregates of Aβ."
Jafa
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Re: Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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Thanks. It’s really hard to know sometimes where the sweet spot is with respect to the interventions we embark on, particularly if the subject of our n=1 trials has yet to display “disease”. I’m going to review my stack, will continue those supplements which help with sleep, but maybe reduce, pulse or cycle through the anti-oxidants. Ben Lynch recommended this approach in his “Dirty Genes” book, and Chris Masterjohn regularly comments that the dose-response curve for most biohacking interventions is “U” shaped, with poorer outcomes present both sides of the optimum.
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CarrieS
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Re: Risks of dampening the inflammatory response?

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Jafa wrote:Like most people on the forum I follow a lot of Bredesen’s protocol re supplements taking Theracurmin, resveratrol and omega 3’s, with the aim of suppressing overactive inflammation. Recently my family were ill with some sort of cold virus which gave them minor symptoms for a few days. However, when I caught what initially appeared to be the same virus I became much more unwell, was febrile for days, had absolutely no energy and was diagnosed by my GP with pneumonia. The prescribed antibiotics didn’t really make much difference for several days so it seems as though it was viral. It’s taken me a month to recover my energy levels and ability to exercise.

My CRP is normally <1 and was 92 while unwell, and my usual mild neutropaenia resolved, the count climbing from 1.2 to over 6. I’ve not yet repeated those bloods.

I’ve been pondering...is there a risk in biohacking the inflammatory response? What if you need those free radicals to wipe out the attacking pathogens? Might we risk losing a pitched battle while we endeavour to play the long game?
Hi Jafa, This article came through my email this morning and seemed relevant to your post so I thought I'd share. Carrie
https://www.mindbodygreen.com/articles/ ... 2_20191223
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