DERMATOLOGIC manifestations of GI disease

[Janice]

This is an important read!

Many disorders of the alimentary tract have dermatologic manifestations (see the Table below). A thorough understanding of the cutaneous/gastrointestinal (GI) relationship can alert the astute clinician to occult disease within the GI tract. This review attempts to explore this relationship by describing disorders involving both the GI tract and the skin.


Dermatologic Manifestations of Gastrointestinal Disease: eMedicine Dermatology

[fritolay66]

Hi Janice,

My own experience with lesions and everything that comes with it, centered around how I treated my gut. The more I treated my gut, the less the lesions appear.

Frito

[tcmgpt13]

Given that the one Morgellons study which was done on one only person showed lesions in the gut, it stands to reason that improving the health of the gut might improve external lesion status, although I think a lot more needs to be known about why there is a gut issue in the first place. Just look at the long list posted here. It boggles the mind and even that might not be what is wrong with us. Hopefully some larger studies and additional gut research (ha, ha, ha, yeah, right, as currently that's scheduled for the 12th of Never) of what we might have will be done at some future date. Then maybe the guess and guess again posts, medicines, alternative treatments and herbs and whatever else is being discussed or tried can be abandoned while treatments that are actually effective can be started.

Oh, and notice how parasitic involvement is not even on this list, but why am I not surprised as this is a list compiled by dermatologists.

[Baraka Obam]

Really interesting, this Scleroderma, see the connection to carrple tunnel, maybe it is one of the nasties pestering us.

[Janice]

Hi Every One!
Just came back from my doctors office. He had a full panel celiac disease test done on me. I will know in a week or so the results. I insisted on getting a prescription of Dapsone for one week. This is for dermatitis herpetiformis.
They say the results can be quite dramatic in as little as a few hours, so we will see. Might not have it... but I am so over the pain. Janice

[tcmgpt13]

Well, I surely hope the dapsone helps Janice, but I would like to say that so far a GF diet has not cured my symptoms. I was not tested but just tried the diet to alleviate hip pain. There is a connection between thyroid issues and gluten sensitivity for some people. Also osteoporosis is connected to both problems. This diet did cure my hip pain within several weeks. This was a couple years before Morgellons set in so when I got Morgellons I was already gluten free. I still got lesions despite this.

Here's what Dr. Beverly (an MD) said about her diet while back. :

"#19- I stay on a gluten-free, low lactose, low refined sugars, high fiber diet: to treat LACTOSE INTOLERANT, CELIAC SPRUE, DIABETES."

As her post said the goal with most of what we do is to relieve symptoms and even reach remission (if possible) but unfortunately so far a cure has not been found. Following a GF diet with a couple more additions has not been the answer to all her issues either. Maybe about 10% of the population (that's considered a high estimate) has celiac issues. So far those who have Morgs and are in the studies carried out by Harvey and Savely follow percentages like these (in fact Savely's latest paper shows maybe about 3% tested positive for celiac). If only answers to Morgellons were straight forward and simple for us. It would be nice.

Here's Dr. Bev's post. There are some interesting suggestions found here. I often wonder how she is doing these days:

Remission is the objective, not complete cure

Originally Posted by Janice

Hi Every One!
Just came back from my doctors office. He had a full panel celiac disease test done on me. I will know in a week or so the results. I insisted on getting a prescription of Dapsone for one week. This is for dermatitis herpetiformis.
They say the results can be quite dramatic in as little as a few hours, so we will see. Might not have it... but I am so over the pain. Janice

[Janice]

Hi, from what I have read so far, if one has celiac disease, alot of times, you have to use dapsone in conjuction with a gluten free diet to get over the hump. Diet alone is not going to do it if you have had it a long time. It could take a year or so of both to be cured. Then one has to maintain the gluten free diet for life.
I don't think it would hurt any one to get a full panel celiac disease test. People just give it a week until my test results come back and we will see. So on with the show... Janice

[tcmgpt13]

Well, I am pretty sure that I am well over that hump as far as a celiac diet helping me as I have followed it since 2003. I still got Morgellons half way through 2005 and I still got lesions. A bumper crop. Hmm, that's eight years ago now. I still get occasional lesions after all this time on the celiac diet.

I just don't want people to get their hopes up that this is the answer to lesions and that following this diet will solve Morgs. It may help, but it does not necessarily promise a lesion free future. If only... It appears that celiac is still a minor issue for most of us in comparison with lyme disease where those conducting studies have noticed about a 95% lyme disease rate in people who have Morgellons symptoms as compared to between 3-5% rate of celiac disease for those of us who have these symptoms. It's more likely there is some poorly understood connection to lyme and lesions than to celiac and lesions. Perhaps the rather transient version of lesions normally seen with lyme disease is more extensive and more persistent than thought, especially if nematode infections are involved. If only someone would look and study what we have instead of just saying it's our imagination.

Originally Posted by Janice

Hi, from what I have read so far, if one has celiac disease, alot of times, you have to use dapsone in conjuction with a gluten free diet to get over the hump. Diet alone is not going to do it if you have had it a long time. It could take a year or so of both to be cured. Then one has to maintain the gluten free diet for life.
I don't think it would hurt any one to get a full panel celiac disease test. People just give it a week until my test results come back and we will see. So on with the show... Janice

[Janice]

What ever.....

[tcmgpt13]

Glad to see you have such an open mind, willing to look at facts and analyze them too.

Originally Posted by Janice

What ever.....

BTW you should be aware of this possible Dapsone side effect since you said you have hepatitis C. A year or two of taking it could be an issue for those with hepatitis:

Toxic hepatitis and cholestatic jaundice have been reported by the manufacturer. Jaundice may also occur as part of the dapsone reaction or dapsone syndrome (see below). Dapsone is also known to inhibit the Cytochrome P450 system.