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glenda
02-23-2006, 09:57 AM
Quote from Aristo Vojdami, Ph.D., M.T;- "Although mycoplasmas are recognized primarily as extracellular parasites or pathogens of mucosal surfaces, recent evidence suggests that certain species may invade the host cells."

--suggesting its ability to cause infection.

Also his quote about MYCOPLASMA GENITALIUM; "This organism could be involved in pelvic inflmmatory disease."

--These statements were in an artical titled "Scientific Facts Versus Fiction About Mycoplasma"



Quoted out of an article by Ali Nawaz Kawaz Khan, MBBS, FRC..(about tuberculosis and the uro-genitourinary tract)- "Bladder tuberculosis infection is almost always secondary to renal involvement. Initially, interstitial cystitis occurs, eventually causing bladder mucosal ulceration and thickening of the bladder wall. End-stage disease causes scarring and bladder fibrosis, resulting in diminished capacity of the urinary bladder."

--NOTE, ACTIVE-tuberculosis which causes infection is difficult for MD's to determine. He also says, "Clinical features of female genital tuberculosis, if any, are nonspecific and diagnosis may be difficult." And, "In the US: The urogenital tract is the second most common site of tuberculosis after the lung."



Quotes out of an artical by - Christof von Eiff, Ralf Rene Reinert, Michel Dresken, Johannes Brauers, Deiter Hafner, and Georg Peters for the Multicenter Study on Antibiotic Resistance in Staphylococci and Other Gram-Positive Cocci Study (Mars) Group;

"Despite advances in antimicrobial therapy, the incidence of severe infections caused by multiple-drug-resistant bacteria has been increasing over the past 20 years."---"The worldwide emergence of multidrug-resistant gram-positive cocci such as MRSA, penicillin-resistant S. pneumoniae, and vancomycin-resistant enterococci as well as the corresponding increase in the number of enterococcal, streptococcal, and particularly staphylococcal infections in certain patients populations has limited clinicians' ability to use currently available antibiotics for therapy. Thus, new antimicrobial agents like quinupristin-dalfopristin are urgently needed."



Clinical investigation- Titled "Interstitial Cystitis: Can Chlamydia pneumoniae Be a Cause?"- Posted 6/16/2003- By- Gregory L. Alberts, MD, William M. Mitchell, MD, PhD, Charles W. Stratton, MD, Jenny J. Franke, MD;

"A possible causative organism of this inflammatory process is "Chlamydia pneumoniae, evidenced in this case report and ongoing studies."---"Franke and colleagues, have proposed a novel association between Chlamydia pneumoniae infecion and IC."---"As an obligte intracellular parasite, it replicates within eukaryotic cells, later releasing infectious, nonreplicating forms into the extracellular milieu. Macrophages do not eradicate this organism, and intracellular persistence may lead to disseminated infection. Organisms have been identified in endothelial and smooth muscle cells..."---"Studies have also explored a potential association between C pneumoniae and other inflammatory disorders..."---"Accurate laboratory diagnosis of C pneumoniae infection presents a difficult clinical challenge. Routine bacterial urine culture in patients with IC uniformly fails to isolate and identify this microorganism."

Case Report- Discussion;

"This case suggests a potential role for the intracellular organism C pneumoniae in the development of this chronic inflammatory process, as demonstrated by positive tissue culture from 2 separate sites. A recent article by Schilling and coworkers suggests a potential mechanism for intracellular persistence of typically noninvasive Escherichia coli. The intracellular location provides a safe haven from host defenses and antibiotic thirapies, while stimulating the production of inflammatory mediators. This persistence may be relevant in considering chronic diseases of the urinary tract, such as recurrent urinary tract infection and IC."---"Urine PCR analysis for the MOMP gene of C pneumoniae was positive in 81% of patients, compared with 27% of controls."



NGU- What is NGU?- Non-gonococcal urethritis (NGU) is an inflammation of the urethra that is not caused by gonorrhea.

What causes NGU?- The primary cause of NGU is a sexually transmitted infection called Chlamydia trachomatis. In approximately one-third of cases, the cause of the symptoms is not identified. In these cases bacteria called Ureaplasma urelyticum or Mycoplasma genitalium may be the cause. However, specific diagnostic tests are not abailable to identify these bacteria.



Quoted by Dr. Garth Nicolson in an interview regarding Chronic Fatigue Syndrome;

"We found that 50-60% of the patients that have these syndromes have infections, chronic infections that are the underlying cause of a lot of their morbidity or their illness and evidence for that is that we can find these micro-organisms deep inside the white blood cells in the blood and they're systemic. They go to all the tissues of the body and all the organs of the body and they cause all these complex signs and symptoms that occur all over the body..." (he's talking about mycoplasmas)--- "What we're finding is that we can't detect these highly pathogenic mycoplasma species in nornmal adults, so it's obviously much more prevalent in the patients with disease. We're looking at a number of other disorders, the most recent one we're looking at is Inflammatory Bowel Disorder and we're finding it there as well. It's very interesting, these different disorders, depending upon the organ system that's involved may involve a different species of mycoplasmas."--- (Dr. Garth Nicolson is the Chief Scientific Officer of the Institute for Molecular Medicine)



Quoted from artical; Why I Prescribe Antibiotics - By Gabe Mirkin M.D.;

"Before I prescribe any medication, I ask myself whether it will help or hurt. All of the autoimmune diseases cause severe disability. Conventional medications neither cure these diseases nor stop the progressive destruction that they cause."---"Accumulating data show that all of these conditions can be caused by infection. Many diseases that were thought to be autoimmune turn out to be infections."---"I know that most physicians who develop these conditions will treat themselves with antibiotics."---"Mycoplasma, chlamydia, and ureaplasma infections are extraordinarily difficult to diagnose and treat. No dependable tests are available to most practicing physicians that will rule infections with these bacteria in or out, and most doctors will not prescribe antibiotics to patients unless they have results of a laboratory test that confirms a specific infection."---"Once these infections are allowed to persist for months or years, they are extraordinarily difficult to cure and often require treatment for many months. Often patients do not take the medication long enough to be cured..."---"Sometimes, the germ has a surface protein that is similar to the surface protein in your cells. Then, not only do the antibodies attach to kill the germ, they also attach to and kill your own cells that have the same surface membranes."---(now talking about infertility)--"Many other studies show that the most common cause of infertility is a uterine infection."--"Infected people may have burning on urination, discomfort when the bladder is full, or an urgency to viod."--"Men and women can be infected with mycoplasma or ureaplasma, even though all available tests can't find them..."-----"If, as expected, no germ grows from the culture and your urine has a positive nitrite or leukocyte esterase test, the odds are overwhelming that you have a mycoplasma, chlamydia or ureaplasma infection and you and your partner should be treated."---"Prostate infections can be extraordinarily difficult to cure so you may have to be treated with injections of very high doses of antibiotics or with antibiotic pills for several months."

Sharon
02-23-2006, 10:16 AM
Interesting. I believe IC has many causes, whatever they may be.

Silverfox
02-23-2006, 07:39 PM
There may be more than one cause.

My Dr. says that I am very rare, as I have the very same burning pains not only in my bladder but also in my hands and feet. My feet feel like I'm walking on hot coals and my middle fingers burns like it has a thousand paper cuts. In my case it is very systemic and seems to be more neurological. I know, like my Dr. says I am so very weired. :loco:

The additional thing in our case is that over time my Mother, and two sisters also developed bladder symptoms and my little sis continues to worsen. She was a young teenager when I married and moved far away. We all have lived for many years far away from each other in different parts of the USA. My older sis seems to have caught it early and no longer has symptoms. My Mother is in a nursing home and still suffers with her bladder symptoms, she has been told she has overactive bladder.

Did we all catch a strange infection from each other???? I had my symptoms since birth, and accordingly my symptoms were worse by the time the others began experiencing the same thing later.

Does this mean that I gave this to my Mother and two sisters? Wish I knew, so I will know if I should blame myself for bringing home an infection that I remember having since I was 3 or 4 years old.

If my Mother and my two sisters did catch this infection from each other or me, why has none of our husbands and none of our 7 children and their 4 kids not caught it yet? These kids are now mostly in their late 20's to late 30's and their 4 little kids, and none have any hint of bladder symptoms. Our family is in the "magic study" a genetic study at the U of Maryland in hopes that researchers will be able to sort it all out someday.

Please God help those IC researchers, and allow them to solve the IC mystery!

glenda
02-25-2006, 11:37 AM
All I can say to this is, it is factual that some bacteria is and can be transmitted verticaly, from mother to fetus, for instance, one that fits this catagory is TB. We all know that this (and probably many other) bacteria can run in the blood line. Not everyone in the family will pick it up, but a percentage will. Also, some men and/or women and children will have an inactive bacteria in their system and because it hasn't become active in them (meaning, it hasn't become infectious, or caused any noticeable problems) they won't have a clue that it's there.

PlainJane
03-01-2006, 02:42 AM
If the mother has chlamydia I think there is somewhere between a 50-75% chance the baby will have it. Those odds are pretty high.

ICNDonna
03-01-2006, 03:21 AM
Glenda, thank you for sharing. Do you have the dates and sources for the articles? It's always helpful to be able to see the progression of studies.

Donna

glenda
03-01-2006, 05:38 AM
I don't know, Donna, but I have listed the researchers names and you may recognize some of them, some are very reputable! I do however have a very recent "dated" artical about the emergence for the development of new antibiotics for the use against many new antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria which is causing infectious outbreaks in the population.---



Wall Street Journal
By MARILYN CHASE
March 1, 2006; Page D2

A physicians' group today will renew its campaign publicizing the dearth of drugs for serious infections and urging Congress to pass new incentives -- including tax breaks and patent extensions -- to spur companies to create new antibiotics.

The infectious Diseases Society of America, a physicians' group that advocates for new treatments, is pushing for initiatives to coax companies to develop drugs for what it called a "hit list" of bad bugs, including drug-resistant staphylococcus aureus.

Drug-resistant staph is spreading at epidemic proportions, now accounting for 60% of skin infections treated in emergency rooms. About two milliion Americans carry resistant staph in their nostrils, and the microbe is involved in about 126,000 hospitalizations a year. More rarely, it can cause bone infections and lethal pneumonias.

In a report in today's edition of Clinical Infectious Diseases, IDSA calls for more antibiotic research for staph and other bad bugs, including resistant E.coli, pseudomonas, enterococcus and acinetobacter bacteria, and the fungus aspergillus.

IDSA said it didn't accept money from drug makers for the report; the group gets a portion of its overall funding from drug makers through advertising in its medical journal and fees paid by exhibitors at its annual meeting.

To build its case this week, IDSA is showcasing the struggle of 16-month-old Bryce Smith of Santee, Calif., who narrowly survived a two-month bout of resistant staph pneumonia that began in late December. Hospitalized at 2 a.m. on New year's Day, Bryce was discharged last Friday after eight weeks in Children's Hospital in San Diego. John Bradley, the hospital's chief of infectious diseases, said Bryce's lungs are scarred and he is still weak. Bryce's mother, Katie Smith, said her son "is resilient. He's trying to walk again."

Where Bryce picked up resistnt staph in the community remains a mystery, Dr. Bradley said. "This bacterium picks the healthiest kids. We have no idea where he got it." Although Bryce responded to a potent cocktail of vancomycin and gentamycin, these drugs carry a risk of hearing loss for which he must be monitored.

Moreover, for many hospital-borne staph strains, Dr. Bradley said, "we are truly running out of drugs."

New drugs can take at least six years and $800 million to $1.7 billion to develop, IDSA says. Moreover, some companies shun antibiotics because their profit potential is limited by brief usage, compared with blockbusters like statins or blood-pressure drugs, which patients take for years.

In its report this week, IDSA complains that the limited pipeline of antibiotics is long on me-too drugs and intravenous products, and short on crucial new compounds and oral drugs needed for outpatient care. More small biotech companies than big pharmaceutical companies have stepped in to fill the gap.

Past legislative attempts to boost incentives for devising new antibiotics have gotten little traction in Washington.

"It's going to take incentives, because it's expensive and laborious to get new molecular entities, "said John Bartlett, an author of IDSA's report and chief of infectious diseases at the Johns Hopkins School of Medicine. "If we've got a problem now, what's it going to be like in 2012?

IDSA endorsed H.R. 3154 -- whose author is Rep. Barbara Cubin (R., Wyo.) -- which offers incentives such as patent extensions, tax credits, fast-track approvals, and clinical-trial grants for host of infectious-disease threats. It also would set up a panel to identify the most dangerous germs and suggest ways to combat them.

The bill's fate is far from certain. Supporters hope the legislation will benefit from White House concerns about pandemic disease threats. Still, there's resistance on Capitol Hill to giving drug companies more breaks. "Debate is stuck on what is fair and reasonable," Dr. Bradley said. "Despite everyone's recognition that this is problem, we haven't yet moved forward."

massagedoula
03-02-2006, 12:28 PM
"Bladder tuberculosis infection is almost always secondary to renal involvement"

So wouldn't our kidneys be messed up too? Curious....

glenda
03-02-2006, 01:47 PM
massagedoula, "almost always"- I would question what they consider almost always, and how much do they know about this FOR SURE. "Renal involvement" - I don't know exactly what they mean by "involvement". Maybe it's possible to have IN-active TB in the kidneys that eventually causes active TB in the bladder, Im not sure. I do know that many people carry inactive TB in there systems that may become active at any time. Also, there seems to be quite a few ICers who have had or still get repeated kidney infections, so this might be something for them to seriously consider looking into.

ICNDonna
03-03-2006, 03:41 AM
If you're concerned about your body carrying TB bacillus, a simple skin test will either confirm or rule this out. I specifically know about this because my father had TB and we all had to be tested during my growing up years. The body is quick to develop antibodies to the tuberculin bacillus and my sister did develop antibodies early on, but without the disease. I was last tested several years ago when I was still working.

If you have any concerns at all in this area, please talk with your physician. We didn't see much tuberculosis for many years, but it's showing up occasionally now so it's okay to ask to be tested.

Donna

glenda
03-03-2006, 07:12 AM
I would just like to add that even though the skin test is simple and can reveal whether or not you carry TB in your system, it's not able to tell you if the TB is active in your body somewhere. It is more difficult to find out if you have active TB such as in the bladder. So, it would be a good idea to get the skin test first so you will know if you even have TB in your system at all. Then, go from there.

Clinical features of female genital tuberculosis, if any, are nonspacific and diagnosis may be difficult.

glenda
03-11-2006, 09:21 AM
This is about Biofilm Infections - good to read! ---


www.arches.uga.edu/~jeffp/harmful.html

ljl765
03-31-2006, 06:06 AM
That was MOST interesting indeed! It gave me a lot to think about. Is it possible that a sexually transmitted disease can cause IC? thanks, sanctuary

glenda
03-31-2006, 12:24 PM
ljl765,

First of all, I think we need to ask ourselves if ic is ONE disease or many different ones resulting in symilar symptoms, since no one really knows what it is. I believe that most or many ic patients suffer from pathologic infestations, but that the pathogens causing symptoms may vary from patient to patient. I think IC is just a name or diagnosis that the MDs slap on patients with symilar symptoms, but they can't figure out what's wrong with them, it kind of gives the docs "a way out - pass". I think we need to start demanding more tests using better testing techniques. Also, I think that the longer we live without proper diagnoses and treatment the more fragile our immune systems become, leaving us wide open for further infestations. So, I think many of us are actually dealing with multiple and mixed infections due to the longevity of our illness and increased immune suppression. And, due to the difficulty in irradicating some pathogens (such as ones that form biofilms), I think that when some of us do seek antibiotic theropy, it's usually low dose, giving the bacteria a chance to develop its own immunities to such treatments, making the abx ineffective. Therefore, even long-term abx theropy, if given in low doses, can contribute to or prolong the illness, making the pathogens more versitile by strengthening their ability to thrive. These are only my opinions, however. Yes, there certainly is a lot to concider!

tks,

PlainJane
04-02-2006, 06:20 AM
ljl765,

First of all, I think we need to ask ourselves if ic is ONE disease or many different ones resulting in symilar symptoms, since no one really knows what it is. I believe that most or many ic patients suffer from pathologic infestations, but that the pathogens causing symptoms may vary from patient to patient. I think IC is just a name or diagnosis that the MDs slap on patients with symilar symptoms, but they can't figure out what's wrong with them, it kind of gives the docs "a way out - pass". I think we need to start demanding more tests using better testing techniques. Also, I think that the longer we live without proper diagnoses and treatment the more fragile our immune systems become, leaving us wide open for further infestations. So, I think many of us are actually dealing with multiple and mixed infections due to the longevity of our illness and increased immune suppression. And, due to the difficulty in irradicating some pathogens (such as ones that form biofilms), I think that when some of us do seek antibiotic theropy, it's usually low dose, giving the bacteria a chance to develop its own immunities to such treatments, making the abx ineffective. Therefore, even long-term abx theropy, if given in low doses, can contribute to or prolong the illness, making the pathogens more versitile by strengthening their ability to thrive. These are only my opinions, however. Yes, there certainly is a lot to concider!

tks,

Glenda,

Your post makes a lot of sense to me. I just got back from being re-tested by Dr.Toth yesterday afternoon. I don't find out the results for two weeks.

Dr.Toth was talking to me a bit about IC. He referred to it as a catch all diagnosis for bladder problems that don't fit into the categories that already exist (ie OAB, etc). Well he put it much more eloquently but I hope I got my point across. I think you're right that IC is probably more that one disease. Like you I think that there is probably a bacterial component to many cases of IC. I actually think bacteria are responsible for a lot of health problems not just IC. It is clear to me that many labs do not adequately culture many bacteria whether because of incompetence or trying to cut back on costs.

I am wondering what type of IC research is being done currently? By the sounds of it not much research is being done but I could be wrong.

Erica

carolynyeo
04-25-2006, 11:22 AM
Hi my mom had TB when she was little and she and I both have IC....

glenda
04-25-2006, 11:53 AM
Hi carolynyeo.

My Grandfather and his sister both had TB, my mom is a carryer (she has an acute and local reaction to the skin test). I am the only one that I know of, in my family, who has IC, but high susceptability to infections definitely runs in my family.