richard@grebyn.com (Richard Cohen) (09/13/90)
Well folks, there is a new 'wonder therapy' on the horizon. It has been
tried on five patients at Morristown Memorial Hospital in Morristown NJ
and four of them have improved rather dramatically <two have become HIV- !!>.
Phase II trials are now underway. The following comes from the August 15, 1990
issue of Annals of Internal Medicine, a major medical journal.
Scientists have known since 1961 that the combination of psoralen <a drug> and
ultraviolet light will cause photochemical inactivation of DNA viruses. In the
mid-80's this therapy was used as a treatment for cutaneous T-cell lymphoma,
a very rare form of cancer. What the treatment involves is as follows: the
patient is given a sizeable amount of psoralen <which apparently has no
side effects>. The next day the patients blood is removed from the body and
put under ultraviolet light and then replaced in the body. This treatment
apparently is quite similar to dialysis and takes approximately four to six
hours <this guess is from my brother who is a physician; it was not in the
article>. The ultraviolet treatment was repeated the next day, again for
four to six hours. And this treatment was performed on a MONTHLY basis.
The results after six months of this therapy are as follows:
Patient 1's T4 count went from 104 to 601; his T4 ratio went from
4% to 34%; he was still HIV+
Patient 2's T4 count went from 529 to 475; ratio from 29% to 31%;
he was still HIV+
Patient 3's T4 count went from 550 to 330; ratio from 34% to 40%;
he became HIV-
Patient 4's T4 count went from 113 to 682; ratio from 11% to 33%;
he remained HIV+, but has since tested HIV- <six months after
treatment was stopped>
Patient 5, a female drug user, had a T4 count drop after treatment
from 232 to 68 <in other words, she got much worse>, her ratio
went from 12% to 13%. She remained HIV+.
Clearly this treatment is very time-consuming, just as dialysis is. But
it seems to be improving the patients dramatically. All five patients
had lymph node problems before therapy; ALL FIVE did not have these problems
after therapy. Work is continuing.