Welcome to my MS CCSVI research fundraising blog. I am currently training for a double (ultra - 4.8 mile swim, 224 mile bike, 52.4 mile run) ironman in September of 2010 in an effort to fundraise for MS CCSVI research. You can check out my fundraiser site at http://www.microgiving.com/profile/chuck. I suggest clicking on the "About Me" tab as the MicroGiving.com templates were a little limiting so the profile page did not allow me to add all the content I wanted to add. MicroGiving.com does not keep any of the donations for administration/overhead fee. That means 100% of your donation goes directly to fund CCSVI MS research. For more information about CCSVI you can go to http://csvi-ms.net/en/content/ccsvi-huge-breakthrough-ms. Please help spread the word about my fundraising efforts. Thanks.


Wednesday, July 14, 2010

More CCSVI and MS Info

An Italian doctor has been getting dramatic results with a new type of treatment for Multiple Sclerosis, or MS, which affects up to 2.5 million people worldwide. In an initial study, Dr. Paolo Zamboni took 65 patients with relapsing-remitting MS, performed a simple operation to unblock restricted bloodflow out of the brain - and two years after the surgery, 73% of the patients had no symptoms. Dr. Zamboni's thinking could turn the current understanding of MS on its head, and offer many sufferers a complete cure.

Multiple sclerosis, or MS, has long been regarded as a life sentence of debilitating nerve degeneration. More common in females, the disease affects an estimated 2.5 million people around the world, causing physical and mental disabilities that can gradually destroy a patient's quality of life.

It's generally accepted that there's no cure for MS, only treatments that mitigate the symptoms - but a new way of looking at the disease has opened the door to a simple treatment that is causing radical improvements in a small sample of sufferers.

Italian Dr. Paolo Zamboni has put forward the idea that many types of MS are actually caused by a blockage of the pathways that remove excess iron from the brain - and by simply clearing out a couple of major veins to reopen the blood flow, the root cause of the disease can be eliminated.

Dr. Zamboni's revelations came as part of a very personal mission - to cure his wife as she began a downward spiral after diagnosis. Reading everything he could on the subject, Dr. Zamboni found a number of century-old sources citing excess iron as a possible cause of MS. It happened to dovetail with some research he had been doing previously on how a buildup of iron can damage blood vessels in the legs - could it be that a buildup of iron was somehow damaging blood vessels in the brain?

He immediately took to the ultrasound machine to see if the idea had any merit - and made a staggering discovery. More than 90% of people with MS have some sort of malformation or blockage in the veins that drain blood from the brain. Including, as it turned out, his wife.

He formed a hypothesis on how this could lead to MS: iron builds up in the brain, blocking and damaging these crucial blood vessels. As the vessels rupture, they allow both the iron itself, and immune cells from the bloodstream, to cross the blood-brain barrier into the cerebro-spinal fluid. Once the immune cells have direct access to the immune system, they begin to attack the myelin sheathing of the cerebral nerves - Multiple Sclerosis develops.

He named the problem Chronic Cerebro-Spinal Venous Insufficiency, or CCSVI.

Zamboni immediately scheduled his wife for a simple operation to unblock the veins - a catheter was threaded up through blood vessels in the groin area, all the way up to the effected area, and then a small balloon was inflated to clear out the blockage. It's a standard and relatively risk-free operation - and the results were immediate. In the three years since the surgery, Dr. Zamboni's wife has not had an attack.

Widening out his study, Dr. Zamboni then tried the same operation on a group of 65 MS-sufferers, identifying blood drainage blockages in the brain and unblocking them - and more than 73% of the patients are completely free of the symptoms of MS, two years after the operation.

In some cases, a balloon is not enough to fully open the vein channel, which collapses either as soon as the balloon is removed, or sometime later. In these cases, a metal stent can easily be used, which remains in place holding the vein open permanently.

Dr. Zamboni's lucky find is yet to be accepted by the medical community, which is traditionally slow to accept revolutionary ideas. Still, most agree that while further study needs to be undertaken before this is looked upon as a cure for MS, the results thus far have been very positive.

Naturally, support groups for MS sufferers are buzzing with the news that a simple operation could free patients from what they have always been told would be a lifelong affliction, and further studies are being undertaken by researchers around the world hoping to confirm the link between CCSVI and MS, and open the door for the treatment to become available for sufferers worldwide.

It's certainly a very exciting find for MS sufferers, as it represents a possible complete cure, as opposed to an ongoing treatment of symptoms. We wish Dr. Zamboni and the various teams looking further into this issue the best of luck.

2 comments:

  1. The CCSVI Liberation Treatment could be the cure but fact remains that the rate of re-occlusion is stuck at 50% and MS patients being treated in the European and Asian countries end up suffering as they did, 3 months ago. While Big Pharmaceutical Corporations and governments in the US and Canada are coming up with new ideas to stop any advancements to the CCSVI theory (Like the superbugs, etc.), millions continue to travel to countries like India and Poland to get this simple procedure and no valuable data is recorded to support the CCSVI theory. Unless we get our position strong enough to support the CCSVI Theory, we will never be able to beat the Pharma Corporations or start the treatment here and many will keep suffering and dying even after having the procedure done. I lost my elder brother last month because of a blood clot in his stent. He got liberated 5 months ago in Poland. We need to prove to the government that this works. Non-profit organizations like the CCSVI Clinic http://www.ccsviclinic.ca/ are tirelessly working to develop safer protocols with teams of world renowned surgeons even though they are feeling the negative pressure from you know who. This Atlanta based Organization has started Clinical Trials for CCSVI and we need to support these groups because they are our only hope to fight for the truth. Without the valuable data that they are collecting offshore, the procedures will not be allowed here, in our own countries.

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  2. Strategic Importance of Jugular Vein Dilatation Otherwise Known as ‘Liberation Therapy’
    The Combination Therapy includes neck vein dilatation based on the findings of Zamboni, et al. The vein dilatation or venoplasty therapy provides the appropriate drainage of the CNS that prevents a retrograde pressure exertion on the myelin sheath covering the CNS. Whatever triggers the autoimmune system to turn on in people predisposed to MS, this back-pressure needs to be resolved. In case after case, the typical symptoms of MS retreat in individuals where the veins are expanded and the flow pressures are equalized. Since keeping the jugular and azygous veins fully open is the key to reducing MS symptoms, it is of paramount importance to know what other post-procedure factors create enduring effect in the venous flow. For example, there is now good clinical and observational evidence to support the fact that stem cells (transplanted intravenously at the time of the venoplasty) reduce swelling, thrombin buildup, clotting and subsequent permanent intraluminal damage leading to scar tissue. As to what has already been established through clinical trials and subsequent therapeutic practice, it has been found that even in patients with severely malformed or abnormal jugular vein structure, the intravenous introduction of autologous stromal cells (MSCs) post-operatively has served to repair injury attributable to venoplastic damage and desquamation of the endothelial and subendothelial cells of the interior venous lumen (tunica intima). Peak velocity, time average velocity vein area, and flow quantification have been assessed by means of echo color Doppler at periodic intervals post-venoplasty. Significant hemodynamic improvement has been recorded at the level of the veins in the neck post-venoplasty. Moreover, this additional stem cell transplantation therapy has led to increased luminal diameter and improved patency rates demonstrating that the introduction of stem cells post-operatively significantly modifies the hemodynamics of the jugular veins more effectively than venoplasty alone.For more information please visit http://www.ccsviclinic.ca or you may call the toll free number at 888-468-1554 or info@ccsviclinic.com

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