The role of the thymus in Lyme Disease.

Rainycloud - research if thymus supplements increase "T" cells.

Vimzor said...
I thought stimulating the immune system in Lyme could backfire and turn into autoimmunity?

not necessarily - what i think i going on is supplement manufacturers in particular and health related press also have totally dumbed down the concept of the immune system until its a single thing with no depth or further resolution - ie its either up or down - like the volume knob on your hi-fi

in reality its a much more complex thing - much more akin to a graphic equaliser with 10 knobs or a mixing desk with 30 or 40.

the body controls the activity of the many components of the immune system ( white blood cells, antibodies, programmed cell death, etc etc ) both locally and systemically by using many signalling molecules and other mechanisms ( analogous to these many knobs on the mixing desk ) and by doing so in different combinations it can switch on or off or ramp up or down the many different components and functions to differing degrees.

many infections - especially the ones with the ability to become chronic - have developed specific ways to try to interfere with and derail that sophisticated system - often by selectively blocking or suppressing some of the very same signalling chemicals - as a result of a long running arms race over evolutionary time.

so when we talk about modulating the immune system - what we are really trying to do in lyme etc - is to try to undo the specific interferences that the microbes are perpetrating - so the immune system can better do what it was intended to all along.

this is however a tricky area where the science is incomplete - and so we are typically working with a mix of the recent science and empirical evidence on how certain herbs (mostly) some foods and supplements have been used historically to good effect with specific infections.

after all - the difference between those of us who get ill from lyme - and those of us that manage to shrug it off without it ever really getting hold is mainly in this area of the immune system function - and if we could get our systems functioning like those of the healthiest of us - we would likely clear the infection

the difficulty is the bacteria have taken hold and the longer they are in charge the worse the immune system gets - so by the time we get a diagnosis there is often a lot of work to undo

interesting reviews on the amazon page - thanks Rainy

i would love to believe them - but am just a bit sceptical as there have been various case of large scale abuse of the reviews system by companies promoting their products

not saying that is defo the case here - just highlighting that, as customers, we have no way of knowing how many of those were potentially sent free products in return for glowing reviews ....

I did some research on an oral version too: Thymomodulin.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/2657249/

Thymomodulin (Ellem Industria Farmaceutica s.p.a., Milan, Italy) is a calf thymus acid lysate derivative, composed of several peptides with a molecular weight range of 1-10 kD. Thymomodulin did not exhibit any mutagenic effect. Furthermore, thymomodulin used in animal studies showed no toxicity even when used at high concentrations. Of major significance are the observations in murine and human systems that thymomodulin remains active when administered orally. In vitro and in vivo administered thymomodulin was able to induce the maturation of T-lymphocytes. Additionally, studies in vitro showed that this thymic derivative can enhance the functions of mature T-lymphocytes with cascading effects on B-cell and macrophage functions. Extensive human clinical trials with thymomodulin showed that this agent can improve the clinical symptoms observed with various disease processes, including infections, allergies and malignancies, and can improve immunological functions during ageing.

Thanks astro!
Hope you're doing well.

So I found out about this clinic in Germany that apparently is big on thymus treatment for Lyme.
I have no plans of flying there, but thought this testimonial was helpful for our discussion:

Dr. **, aka **, is an amazing and compassionate doctor. He "gets" this illness and knows how to treat it with stem cells, glandular medicine, supportive infusions and other natural therapies. He understands the connections with Lyme and thymus injury that not a single doctor in the U.S. has ever mentioned. He can even measure if your thymus has been corrected to Th1/Th2 function balance. I think this is one of the reasons that stem cell therapy at his clinic is more successful than getting stem cells elsewhere.

On their website it says this (check out the last part of the sentence):

We use a wide variety of substances in iv. treatments: EGCG, high dose vitamin C, Artemisinin, the PK protocol, Myers cocktail, NADH and NAD+, MitoEnergy and HPU/KPU-mixes, Licorice, propolis and honey, Germanium, S-acetyl-glutathione, high dose Lysin, Alpha-lipoic acid, Bicarbonate, Hepamerz/L-ornithine, Thymosin Alpha/Beta and thymus gland extracts, etc.

This is their website: https://www.villa-medigruen.de/?lang=en

RainyCloud said...
Thanks astro!
Hope you're doing well.

So I found out about this clinic in Germany that apparently is big on thymus treatment for Lyme.
I have no plans of flying there, but thought this testimonial was helpful for our discussion:

Dr. **, aka **, is an amazing and compassionate doctor. He "gets" this illness and knows how to treat it with stem cells, glandular medicine, supportive infusions and other natural therapies. He understands the connections with Lyme and thymus injury that not a single doctor in the U.S. has ever mentioned. He can even measure if your thymus has been corrected to Th1/Th2 function balance. I think this is one of the reasons that stem cell therapy at his clinic is more successful than getting stem cells elsewhere.

On their website it says this (check out the last part of the sentence):

We use a wide variety of substances in iv. treatments: EGCG, high dose vitamin C, Artemisinin, the PK protocol, Myers cocktail, NADH and NAD+, MitoEnergy and HPU/KPU-mixes, Licorice, propolis and honey, Germanium, S-acetyl-glutathione, high dose Lysin, Alpha-lipoic acid, Bicarbonate, Hepamerz/L-ornithine, Thymosin Alpha/Beta and thymus gland extracts, etc.

This is their website: https://www.villa-medigruen.de/?lang=en

Finally...there's a Dr not ignoring what cd57 testing is showing! L O W immune cells! Something other Drs are puzzled with and prob one reason why some stay ill.

Hi all,

My Thymosin Alpha 1 arrived today

just a brief update to say i asked the farm where i buy my meat about obtaining ox thymus gland material from their grass fed Aberdeen angus cattle. they are familiar with many organ meats and regularly have tongue, heart, liver, kidney, ox tail, onglet, etc but had not hear of thymus at all being consumed.

they said they would ask the abattoir where they send their animals for slaughter if they can have it back on the next animal - the way it works is the owner is entitled to have any part of their animal back as long as there are not rules against it (gov. regulations for health and safety i believe ) - and some offal / glands are not allowed to have back in circulation for human consumption - normally the abattoir disposes of anything the farmer does not want or it goes to pet food etc.

Good luck rainy, will be following this experiment with interest!

"Boost your Immune System with Thymosin Alpha-1":

https://thebiostation.com/bioblog/boost-immune-system-thymosin-alpha-1/

I see that is offered as a nasal spray too...

If purchased in the US, is it Rx only?

keep us updated

Thank you both so much!

I will definitely keep you all updated, I still have 4 injections left, and I'm pretty sure I'm going to order more.

astro: I think dcd can explain this better than me, but it's more of an unregulated market from what I understand. Where it's not really banned to sell and buy without a script, but at the same time if you want to get it from a compounding pharmacy you would need a script. At least this is my understanding. Most vendors sell them as research peptides "not for human use", but in my understanding that's more of a legal thing and most people just buy them at these vendors anyway.

That's what I did myself too.

I'm currently temporarily in Europe so I bought it from a local company here without a script. It was also stated here that it was "not for humans" and "research use only".

Back in the states there are also many companies like this where you can buy without a script, this company for example is used very often in the peptide community but I've never used them myself (yet):

https://www.peptidesciences.com/thymosin-alpha-1-10mg

I think dcd knows more about where to buy though, so I hope he chimes in.
Wherever you buy, just make sure to email them first, and ask if they test every batch.

You don't want a company that just resells peptides from China without testing them first.
It's ok if they are made in China (most of them are), but they have to be tested locally before selling.

Garzie: that's so great about astragalus, I'm going to read all about it. I've never tried that one before!
Maybe they will even compliment each other, do you think it might? Looks like it might be worth buying for me too.
Your results sound super promising, I truly hope it continues to help you!

That's also interesting about your skin flaring up Garzie, I have something similar where every time something works my knees give out under me and my upper legs feel sore.

Rainly i do think a lot of these immune regulating things can be complementary and maybe even synergistic

the problem is so much of the immune system is still unknown - and we are also all different in significant ways ( our immune systems are one of the ways humans are hyper variable - if we weren't a pandemic would have wiped us all out long ago)

for me - antimicrobial treatments have so far been helpful but not curative - whereas things i do for my immune system seem to each help a little bit and take longer - but those improvements seem to hold up
-keto diet
-focus on sleep
-regular exercise - esp resistance training
-Buhner immunomodulating herbs and adaptogens
-LDN - hard to ramp up but seems to drive significant improvements in physical ability
-Ivermectin - think i have had an small increase in the rate of recovery since adding this
-astragalus - jury still out but had best ever sleep while on this - esp on higher doses - could still do workouts but felt more fatigue and achiness - slower walking and 20-30% less jobs done in each day - decided the higher doses were not worth it and i would try low and slow for a good while first

conceptually - i think the best possible outcome would be for our immune systems to figure out what is going on in our bodies - and sort that out - be it infection or dysregulation or both. i also think without a decent functioning immune system ( not perfect but adequate for the job) no amount of antibiotics will kill every last persister cell in each little niche in our bodies deepest darkest places - that is science fiction.

the reality is that abx are always working in tandem with our immune systems - and one member of that team is either playing its part ort letting the side down. in AIDS patients its the latter - and no amount of antibiotics or anti-fungals can save the patient - unless they can get the immune system functional - which illustrates this point well - but i think a lot of people still view our bodies as some kind of giant inert petri dish where there are bugs and antibiotics and the antibiotics kill all the bugs end of story - but that is a gross oversimplication.

this is why i have persevered with this approach. strong antimicrobial thereapies alone just were not working for me

i should add that i have been on my current program for around 2 years gradually trying to build my immune function and gradually improving over that time to 50% recovered - i am less sure if the astragalus would be helpful earlier in my illness when things were worse - it may have been too much - as it is my doses are still small total 1ml of tincture per day - vs buhners acute lyme doses of 1000mg powdered root ramping up to 16g of powdered root. so i am at around 1/4 of his starting dose

on astragalus - my advice would be to try it at a low dose - away from any other changes to diet , lifestyle or supplements / treatments and keep careful notes so you can understand how it effects you.

Post Edited (Garzie) : 8/16/2021 3:47:24 AM (GMT-6)