Bill's pure dimethylfumarate thread

[Fred]

After going through some old posts (thanks Fred) and doing a little reading,

You are welcome Bill. I'm pleased to see some people finding this place useful to look back on.

[JohnB]

It does make interesting reading going back over old posts, and its good to see your alchemy is working well Bill .

I am going to
a)have to do a medical degree
b) look up a lot on an unbiased search engine

You lost me somewhere round Woolworths with your conversation with Caroline

[jiml]

I think the beauty of the forum for looking back is the locked journals so you can look back easily at your own treatments.

[Bill]

Hi John. Glad to read of your good results with apremilast. My niece takes it as well for her psoriasis, although it is quite expensive where she lives.

I certainly hit a bump. As there is no advice on how to manage lymphopaenia with DMF, other than to reduce dosage or cease taking it, all I can do is to try things that might help. Glutamine is advised for immunosuppressed patients, and going over my posts it seemed to help when my lymphocyte count was low. The research I found suggests that glutamine supplements are of no benefit in reversing a lymphopaenia resulting from exercise. I am hoping that a combination of things might have some synergies.

Cheers

[jiml]

I'm sorry you seem to have hit a stumbling block Bill I can't suggest anything to try to get the lymphocytes up apart from reducing further your intake of the DMF

I have never taken supplements or vitamins and never changed my eating habits so can't offer a glimmer of hope about anything I've tried but I'll look on with interest and hope you find a solution. It's such a shame as it works so well for you if you could just get over this hump
Good luck

[JohnB]

Very much with tongue lodged very firmly in cheek, if the lymphocytes are suffering through exercise..........

Stop exercising 

[Bill]

Excellent advice if exercise was the cause, John. The problem is that I can only guess why it happened and guess what measures might help. There is a lot of noise which confuses things considerably.

Cheers

[Bill]

Another blood test yesterday.



So with a four and a half week pause in dosing, my lymphocyte count has almost doubled. Unlike Jim and Caroline, I am of the opinion that supplements are of use in helping to restore or support low wbc counts. There was an article published in the BMJ last month (Nutrition, Immunity and Covid-19). I have supplemented with many of the things discussed, and suspect that zinc and selenium supplementation might be worthwhile for me. Of interest, lymphocytes increased concurrently with a drop in haemoglobin. I can now resume dosing with dimethyl fumarate and will have another test in three months. I hope you are well. I will be walking my pups shortly.

Cheers

[Caroline]

Another blood test yesterday.



So with a four and a half week pause in dosing, my lymphocyte count has almost doubled. Unlike Jim and Caroline, I am of the opinion that supplements are of use in helping to restore or support low wbc counts. There was an article published in the BMJ last month (Nutrition, Immunity and Covid-19). I have supplemented with many of the things discussed, and suspect that zinc and selenium supplementation might be worthwhile for me. Of interest, lymphocytes increased concurrently with a drop in haemoglobin. I can now resume dosing with dimethyl fumarate and will have another test in three months. I hope you are well. I will be walking my pups shortly.

Cheers

Looks really great your lympho’s, excellent result. In another post I have said that zinc and selenium are important in making your immune system ready for dealing with Covid, and that may be the best and cheapest way to protect yourself against it.
I am currently supplying selenium and Q10 myself. Cant find a good zinc supplier yet.
And what have you done with your Eos? They seem a bit out of line..

Also great pups you have Bill.

[Bill]

Thanks for the independent confirmation, Caroline. For zinc I use a rash powder, which is 25% zinc oxide (only need a very small amount). The last time I had a four week break from DMF there was no change in my lymphocyte count, so I believe that supplementation has been effective. The question is which supplement or combination of supplements is effective? Given the result I think I will continue supplementing and take three doses of 430mg weekly until my next test. I don't share the view that a low lymphocyte count indicates efficacy as there was as patient who developed a primary progressive ms after discontinuing DMF and while the lymphocyte count was still low. Thanks for pointing out the error in my table of results. Here is the corrected version.

Cheers