Nickel's upcoming presentation at AUA 2003 confirms Dimitrakov's findings, and refines it a little by showing a definite, but small (and statistically insignificant), increase in improvement by a quinolone antibiotic over placebo.alprost wrote:In Dr Dimitrakov's study the trial period for the drug/placebo was 6 weeks, and, if I have read Dr. Shoskes review paper correctly, there was no difference between Cipro and placebo at the end of this 6 week period. Would this be expected if Cipro had significant anti-inflammatory effects in IIIb CPPS?
There is no doubt at all in my mind about the ability of certain antibiotics, in a small group of genetically select people, to have an anti-inflammatory effect. I am not one of these people. But I have read literally hundreds of messages like the one at the start of this thread, in which men report feeling OK while on the antibiotic but immediately relapse when off it. Many of these men report that the effect finally wears off, as some sort of tolerance develops, or as the biochemical character of their inflammation and pain changes (with so many cytokines and neurological processes involved, it's not surprising).
BTW, the anti-inflammatory effect of antibiotics is not unique to chronic pelvic pain. If you look around you'll find it being discussed in relation to many other diseases and disorders.
