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(More customer reviews)I was diagnosed with ulcerative colitis a few months before my 22nd birthday. I tried all kinds of medications - Asacol, cortisone, Colazal, and Canasa. The cort did nothing, Asacol worked at first (when my disease was at it's mildest), and Colazal only worked somewhat if I used it in conjunction with Canasa. I basically experienced a continuous flareup that vascillated between liveable, bad, and really bad for about two years. My BMs never went back to what they were before I was diagnosed and I was starting to get desperate. Hence my purchase of VSL#3.
I was really optimistic and hopeful that VSL#3 would work, mostly because of the events that preceded my diagnosis. Before I ever developed UC symptoms, I was extremely prone to infections and as a result, I took high doses of strong (and now we know sometimes dangerous) antibiotics several times a year. This went on for about two years. At the end of that period, I mysteriously stopped getting infections but developed a lack of fine motor control in both of my hands. At first I was told it was carpal tunnel, but a nerve study showed that this was an incorrect diagnosis and my orthopaedic doctor basically threw his hands up in the air and sent me on my way. About a year after that, I developed colitis, and with that came a whole host of symptoms that my gastroenterologist couldn't/didn't care to explain. I had joint pain; extreme swelling of the Achilles that would switch sides; swelling in my knees, elbow, finger, and jaw joints; swelling and painful bumps on the bottoms of my feet. It got to the point where I couldn't walk some days.
Now I don't want to say that VSL is a miracle drug. I'm no doctor, but I am a biologist and I do understand how the body works. Colitis is supposedly a result of a chronically overactive immune system, which may result from the presence of certain types of bacteria in the colon. The antibiotics I had been on have since been linked to (surprise!): a particular type of colitis caused by antibiotics wiping out the normal flora in your intestine, which is replaced by rapidly reproducing pathogenic bacteria, AND joint, particularly wrist, problems. After I learned all of this, I proposed to my doctor that perhaps my history of antibiotic use had upset the balance of bacteria in my colon, which caused my immune system to overreact and begin attacking my own tissues, not just in my colon, but in my joints and tendons as well. This would have explained the wide range of strange symptoms I was having, but he, again, waved it off.
Anyway, I said screw him and tried VSL anyway in the hopes that it would restore the balance of flora in my colon, if that were actually the problem. Low and behold, after two years of straight sufferring, within a couple of months of beginning VSL, I had my first normal BM. I am now taking 4 Colazal a day (instead of 9) and only using the Canasa every other day. Maybe it's not a miracle drug and my VSL use just happened to coincide with a freak trip into remission, as my doctor suggests. But I've learned not to trust everything my doctors say. They don't know everything, and I'm educated enough to make non-detrimental decisions for my own health.
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