★★★★★
This recent case report (January, 2023) Involves a woman with Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis (ALS) / Lou Gehrig's Disease. It is just one case report, but I wanted to mention it because of the treatment used, Fecal Microbiota Transplantation (FMT) and the results gotten from FMT.
Here is a link to the report :
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC9898040/
It is worth mentioning that they used the newest form of FMT, Washed Microbiota Transplantation (WMT) in this woman and the results were fairly impressive compared to just about anything else that might be used for ALS.
The woman suffered an accidental trauma to her scalp after starting WMT, which her doctors treated with antibiotics, unfortunately the antibiotics caused the ALS to deteriorate significantly again. WMTs were deployed again after the antibiotic regimen as a rescue treatment which quickly reduced the worsened symptoms again and stopped the progression of the disease again. She received a new WMT every two to three months and this stopped the progression of the ALS as long as she continued with the regular application of WMT, though they weren't very clear on that point.
During the course of WMT, symptoms would reverse and then plateau in a sequence during the course of WMTs. The report reached the following conclusion based on this single case report :
' The stool and blood samples from the first WMT to the last were collected for dynamic microbial and metabolomic analysis. We observed the microbial and metabolomic changing trend consistent with the disease status. This case report for the first time shows the direct clinical evidence on using WMTs for treating ALS, indicating that WMT may be the novel treatment strategy for controlling this so-called incurable disease. '
I felt that this case study illustrates the potential of FMT/WMT as a viable treatment for ALS and possibly other diseases. Currently, FMT in the US is used almost exclusively for Clostridia Difficile (C-diff) infection that does not respond to standard antibiotic therapy and in such cases, can be fatal, so FMT is more of a last ditch effort.
With this new form of FMT, referred to as WMT, the transplants are filtered and cleaned or washed to make them safer than ever before. It isn't mainstream yet, but with future studies, WMT appears likely to become the new standard for FMT.
There are currently no known treatments that can stop the progression of ALS, but this case report is showing the potential of FMT/WMT to do just that. Given that ALS patients have an average life expectancy of just 3 to 5 years, this is huge and important news for people with ALS, but this case report received little if any news coverage.
My impression from this case report of an ALS patient using WMT as a treatment is that starting treatment immediately after diagnosis is important because while WMT may have stopped the disease progression and significantly improved symptoms, it did not completely reverse symptoms, so starting before there are very significant symptoms may offer the best chance for the best quality of life and outcomes for ALS patients.
Art
