Alzheimer's disease - a neurospirochetosis.

The Journal of NeuroInflamation ^ | August 4, 2011 | By Judith Miklossy, MD

[Swordmaker]

Alzheimer's disease - a neurospirochetosis. Analysis of the evidence following Koch's and Hill's criteria.

Judith Miklossy
Correspondence: Judith Miklossy judithmiklossy@bluewin.ch

Journal of Neuroinflammation 2011, 8:90 doi:10.1186/1742-2094-8-90

Published: 4 August 2011
Abstract (provisional)

It is established that chronic spirochetal infection can cause slowly progressive dementia, brain atrophy and amyloid deposition in late neurosyphilis. Recently it has been suggested that various types of spirochetes, in an analogous way to Treponema pallidum, could cause dementia and may be involved in the pathogenesis of Alzheimer's disease (AD). Here, we review all data available in the literature on the detection of spirochetes in AD and critically analyze the association and causal relationship between spirochetes and AD following established criteria of Koch and Hill. The results show a statistically significant association between spirochetes and AD (P = 1.5 x 10-17, OR = 20, 95% CI = 8-60, N = 247). When neutral techniques recognizing all types of spirochetes were used, or the highly prevalent periodontal pathogen Treponemas were analyzed, spirochetes were observed in the brain in more than 90% of AD cases. Borrelia burgdorferi was detected in the brain in 25.3% of AD cases analyzed and was 13 times more frequent in AD compared to controls. Periodontal pathogen Treponemas (T. pectinovorum, T. amylovorum, T. lecithinolyticum, T. maltophilum, T. medium, T. socranskii) and Borrelia burgdorferi were detected using species specific PCR and antibodies. Importantly, co-infection with several spirochetes occurs in AD. The pathological and biological hallmarks of AD were reproduced in vitro. The analysis of reviewed data following Koch's and Hill's postulates shows a probable causal relationship between neurospirochetosis and AD. Persisting inflammation and amyloid deposition initiated and sustained by chronic spirochetal infection form together with the various hypotheses suggested to play a role in the pathogenesis of AD a comprehensive entity. As suggested by Hill, once the probability of a causal relationship is established prompt action is needed. Support and attention should be given to this field of AD research. Spirochetal infection occurs years or decades before the manifestation of dementia. As adequate antibiotic and anti-inflammatory therapies are available, as in syphilis, one might prevent and eradicate dementia.

The complete article is available as a provisional PDF. The fully formatted PDF and HTML versions are in production.

[old and tired]

What about hydrogen peroxide instead of the Clorox?

[Valpal1]

Check this out! And a simple cheap preventative!

[Swordmaker]

Do you do the baking soda daily? Also, do you floss before or after the baking soda? I’ve always liked baking soda as a toothpaste but my dentist discouraged it as it is a bit abrasive. Very interesting.

Daily. Floss with the baking soda... work it down into the gums. And your dentist is an idiot. Pumice is far harder than the enamel of your teeth... while baking soda is only 90% as hard as enamel, so it can't scratch it. Pumice in toothpaste will erode your enamel, baking soda will not.

The dentist at my office started as an engineer in the space program... and works with dental materials science... and is a full professor at the University of Alabama Mobile, Department of Dental Materials. They made him one just so he could give two lectures a year there! He has more alphabet after his title of DDS than we have room for on his letterhead. He was the Keynote speaker at the Indian Society of Oral Implantology in Pune India, just outside of Mumbai, in January, where they made him a National Scholar (although he's not Indian), with a special funny hat and orange scarf and all that... sort of an Indian Nobel (without the money). Trust him.

[Mind-numbed Robot]

Will hydrogen peroxide work instead of bleach? Many years ago an old dentist told me to use baking soda as a teeth cleaner and then rinse with hydrogen peroxide. He said tooth decay is caused by the acid produced when bacteria eat the substances on our teeth and the acid eats into the teeth. The baking soda neutralizes the acid and the HP3 kills the bacteria. Sounded like a win-win.

[Swordmaker]

I can’t use baking soda either. I have veneers. I was told NOT to use baking soda or salt because it scratches them.

Bull Pucky... It's softer than the material of the veneers! Don't use salt. What did they make their veneers out of? Plastic???

[greeneyes]

What if you just mixed them with water and used one of those irrigators at the gum line?

[FredZarguna]

While it might be unfair to make a judgment on the basis of an abstract and your less than rigorous anecdotal evidence following the abstract; I do not see in what's presented here that Koch and Hill postulates are really being followed to imply causality.

Hill (it has always seemed to me) is somewhat more subjective and I won't address Hill's criteria. But there are two problems in the Koch postulates as applied in the abstract, to wit:

First Postulate:

"The microorganism will occur in every case of the disease and can explain the pathology and clinical changes associated with the disease (specificity)"

You don't make the claim that spirochetes are seen in all cases, just 90%. That is actually a violation of Koch, not a confirmation.

For example: long before AIDs mechanisms were known or even hypothesized, a number of other candidate viral causes (HTLV, Cytomegalo virus) were ruled out because these were not seen in all cases, whereas HIV was. [But HTLV particularly was seen in the early days in "nearly" all cases.]

Second Postulate:

The microorganism must be shown to be distinct from any others that might be found with the disease.

Again, there is no evidence that you have made this finding to the exclusion of all other possibilities, and indeed seem to muddy the waters by claiming that multiple spirochetes have to be present. OK, then, what else might also necessarily be present? And please note that although you satisfy the third Koch requirement: that the result can be produced in vitro, that mitigates against, but does NOT entirely answer the issue with the 2nd criterion, because it is always possible that effects produced in vitro still require additional precursors, catalysts, or factors in vivo.

Are these issues actually addressed in the full article?

[BlazingArizona]

This is an interesting hypothesis, BUT - not only has it been around for a long time, but it has been held questionable for a long time. Try this 1993 reference:

http://journals.lww.com/neuroreport/Citation/1993/07000/Alzheimer_s_disease_and_spirochetes__a.1.aspx

[reformedliberal]

I do trust this. I use baking soda and peroxide 3x/week. Make a paste and floss it into the gum line. When I started doing this, about 20 years ago, my physician relatives all snickered and made comments about my being impressed with the foaming action. I have ignored them, as they have been wrong about H. pylori and several other newer therapies that work.

I have a couple of questions, though:

1) Does baking soda or peroxide or bleach solution damage bonding? While I have bonding on 3 teeth, I have only had degradation on one incisor. I was blaming the baking soda/peroxide, even though it didn’t make sense, since the other bonded teeth were fine.

2) I have been on a low dose doxycycline for posterior stye (chalazion) off and on for a few years. I notice when I am on doxy, my mouth is much fresher in the morning. I assume it is attacking oral bacteria. Doxycycline is also used in Lyme’s therapy. Do you have any info on that?

[Swordmaker]

Would you please check into the Listerine (because I can’t use baking soda) which kind works best and clarify about the “blue cap” bleach?

Blue cap bleach is CLOROX™ brand bleach with out additives... make it fresh every day you use it. That alone will do the trick... if you won't use the baking soda... but make sure you get it down into the gums. Don't use the Clorox every day. It will dissolve your skin.

I don't know why your dentist told you that baking soda was so abrasive (MOHS hardness scale 2.5) but it is very low compared to toothpaste... which has PUMICE (MOHS hardness scale 6), lava suspended in it... mostly ground volcanic glass. That is about 20% harder than your own enamel (MOHS hardness scale 5) of your teeth... and will scratch porcelain (MOHS hardness scale 3.5 to 6). Even if your veneers were plastic (MOHS hardness scale 3.5) baking soda would not scratch it! NetMilMom, this is science and engineering... and this is not open to opinion. You can look these things up on the net.

You are free to believe your dentist... but he is an engineering idiot who apparently slept through class.

Again, my doctor was also a full professor of Dentistry at University of California San Francisco... he has 30 years of experience in Dental Materials science. I think I'd believe him.

[mc5cents]

I brush my teeth with a mixture of hydrogen peroxide and baking soda.

Really? I mean really! What is wrong with this stuff

Tastes a whole lot better too.

[decimon]

Thanks, grey_whiskers.

Oral hygiene ping.

[Swordmaker]

Thank you for the information and posting, Swordmaker. I have used peroxide with baking soda a few times a week. However, I will also add the newer recommendations!

MomtoThree, the peroxide may not be a good idea... it actually can help some bacteria. Part of the breakdown of its chemistry it adds oxygen... making some of the bugs happier. In addition, we've seen some patients who used peroxide, albeit to whiten their teeth, come in with transparent teeth. It also INCREASES tooth sensitivity. It depends on how much you use and the strength. Sparing use is OK.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

I’m no chemist but I know that peroxide must be used immediately so I want it all fresh and I use baking soda for deodorant. I try to use as many natural products as possible. I may be on to something.

[Dinah Lord]

Bttt

[Dinah Lord]

Bttt

[Swordmaker]

Wow, that’s some dental office you’ve got there! Thanks for the info.

Thanks, we are proud of it. Our primary doctor has developed some of the main implant systems that are in use around the world. He was instrumental in developing the Custom Osseous Integrated Implant system (COII) that now has demonstrated a survival rate of over 97% at ten years... 100% for his implants. And they actually integrate to the bone. We now have, I believe, seven recovered jaws from deceased patients with implants that have shown regenerated jaws where the bone has grown completely around the implants at the molecular level, integrating the implant to the jaw, transferring the forces from the dentures mounted on the implant to the jaw, so that the body found it necessary to rebuild the jaw from where before it had reclaimed the calcium. This was something other dentists said would never occur. These COII's which are indistinguishable on X-RAY from subperiostal implants—which almost every dentist will tell you are failures at placement because they heal in scar tissue and should be removed because they have a 50% failure rate at 10 years—will last a lifetime. The dentists who don't know what these are will INSIST they have to be removed at once.

[Swordmaker]

Sorry, Swordmaker, another question popped in my mind. Can children use the clorox with water as a rinse as well? My youngest is 5... can she use it as well?

Yes, if you can get them to. It tastes like strong swimming pool water. As for safety, if they swallow some of it, it turns to ordinary table salt in the stomach. Chemically it is Socium Hypochlorite - NaClO... Drop the Oxygen and you have NaCl... salt. Sodium Chloride.

You DO have to make it fresh every time you use it. It does not keep.

[glorgau]

Alcohol based mouthwashes don't do it, either.

How about peroxide based mouthwashes?

[Swordmaker]

I was told that H2O2 would weaken enamel. What would laundry bleach do?

In dilute solutions like Dakin's solution, nothing. Enamel is hard...