Dr. James Schaller’s new book is now here! Get your copy of Combating Biofilms book today!
BOOK EXCERPTS
Who Has Biofilm Infections?
When you learn about the massive diversity of locations and situations in which biofilms are common and consider that that are often the routine state of bacteria and fungal organisms, you start to realize anyone may have a biofilm infection or infections.
What Are We Looking For in This Book?
The following material will show many ways to break through the “egg white,” or biofilm. Once that happens, it is usually much easier to destroy the infection represented by the egg yolk or yellow center.
Biofilms Are a Leading Cause of Suffering and Death
Biofilm Body Locations and Situations
• An infection lasting over 2 weeks
• The leading cause of death in children under 6 years of age
• Dental plaque—the human mouth harbors about 25,000 species of bacteria, about 1,000 of which reside in the dental plaque biofilm.
• Yeast infections
• Postsurgical infections
• Cancer
• Bad breath
• Gum disease or periodontitis*
• Tooth decay
• Lung infections
• Urinary system infections
• Oral bacteria—can harm heart arteries and cause death and increase intestinal cancers
• Chronic ear infections
• Sinus infections**
• Chronic tonsillitis
• Wounds
• Tooth brush heads — including sonic moving head styles
Catheters to allow urine removal
• Artificial knees, hips, and other replacements
• Heart valve infections
• Lesions or sores
• Lyme disease
• IV catheters of any type
• Urinary catheters
• Contact lenses
• Implanted devices—any implanted or inserted device can send bacteria to the brain, liver or kidneys.
• Chronic prostate infections
• Legionnaire’s disease and many other biotoxin bacteria that explode in any indoor water
• Mold illnesses—which can arise from mold build up in any standing indoor water, i.e., flooding, roof, basement or window leaks, humidifiers, unused Waterpik™ or other tooth cleaning devices, condensation in AC ducts, etc.
• Cystic fibrosis—excess mucus production in the airways allows bacteria like Pseudomonas aeruginosa to beat bacteria killers behind a biofilm coat.
• Lost body parts
• Skin, hair or nail infections
• Arthritis
• Endocarditis
• Bone infections
• Acne
Many other things could be added to the list, including profoundly serious issues of biofilm contamination in water and dozens of other health-related and manufacturing practices.
*Doctor David Kennedy, a retired dentist, lamented that most adult Americans have gum disease—another bacterial biofilm condition involving chronic infection. So just how widespread is this stealthy healthcare epidemic?
**At Ondine Biopharma, an interview [with Richard Longland] revealed that 38,000,000 people in this country have (or had) a chronic sinus problem.
***Ricardo Murga; Terri S. Forster. Role of biofilms in the survival of Legionella pneumophila in a model potable-water system. Microbiology (2001), 147, 3121–3126.
A Medical Revolution
The theory of biofilm infection is a profound revolution in the study of infections which can be painful, disabling and in fact, are a top killer depending on one’s age. Infections are starting to return us to the days when people died of simple infections. The new biofilm infection world could kill more people than WWI and WWII combined if things do not quickly change in both developed and undeveloped nations. Due to a slow understanding of the importance of biofilms and therefore, a slow adoption by physicians of new biofilm solutions, even cutting edge doctors might only take biofilms seriously when it has been proven that more people are becoming disabled and die due to them. Currently, most miss biofilms as the cause of suffering and death.
So, biofilms without solutions are as serious as polio in the 19th century without a vaccine, and in terms of numbers of victims, they are far more devastating than HIV/AIDS. Most bacteria live in communities that typically have unique protective biofilms. 1% of bacteria infecting humans or impacting human life are floating alone and when they are found in blood, they would not be found together with any biofilm slime. The National Institutes of Health estimates that more than 80% of microbial infections in the human body are caused by biofilm, many of them creating chronic and reoccurring problems. Or, is Glowacki right and 99% of bacteria live in a biofilm? Whether you use NIH’s 80% or Glowacki’s 99% as the estimate, biofilms are a serious consideration in infections. Głowacki R, Strek P, Zagórska-Swiezy K, Składzień J, Oleś K, Hydzik-Sobocińska K,Miodoński A. [Biofilm from patients with chronic rhinosinusitis. Morphological SEM studies].[Article in Polish]. Otolaryngol Pol. 2008;62(3):305-10.
Making Biofilms Clear
Making “Biofilms” Clear A biofilm is like a dime in the center of a pool of olive oil, and on the outer edge of the oil is pepper representing infection killing cells. They cannot move in to destroy the dime. Biofilm bacteria communities are the usual state of most human infections. We have been taught that infections are isolated bacteria floating around and this is a serious error. It shows how far we need to go in science if the main form of bacteria— biofilm bacteria communities—is a new, but crucial, concept. When I made a list in 2004 of twenty-five options to kill biofilms, there wasn’t much interest. The goal in writing and publishing this book is to make an affordable research- based set of options along with other possible options, to present a pure book of solutions offering the newest possible current and up to date solutions for the hundreds of diseases associated with biofilms. The barrier of a biological film can be utterly impossible to remove or penetrate with the routine options used by physicians, infection specialists, naturopaths, alternative medicine schools, essential oil practitioners, acupuncturists, nurse practitioners or herbalists.
With this book we hope to serve you and your physician/healer by the exploration of options available now. We searched the past five years of publications on PubMed—the massive database for medical science— for “biofilm treatment.” The range of options is impressive and not always things you might expect. This book is meant to give you broad options to prevent your suffering, disability and even death. After years of research and study, I have come to realize that the infectious disease “experts” on biofilm may have long since lost the war, and in fact, many may not ever have been aware of all the battles. Patients and researchers were learning basic things about infections in 2012 and 2013 which shatter trust in infection specialists.
Most people, and infectious disease doctors themselves believe that an infection physician knows all infections. Much of their work is related to HIV, Hepatitis B and C, Tuberculosis, strong pneumonia, the antibiotic resistant staph infection MRSA, sepsis [bacteria in the blood], post surgical infections, Flu, Meningitis, Rotavirus, Streptococcus, Clostridium difficile (caused in part by lack of knowledge of the benefits of high quality probiotics), infections of various body part implants, and a finite number of other serious infections. Many of these are very hard to treat, such as AIDS, which requires the care of someone trained in very advanced medical science.
The point is, however, that infection physicians do not usually have the time to research all the options to handle biofilms because even to become an infection “expert” on just one infection, it takes about a year to read all the applicable articles, ponder, and see how they may apply to many people. Therefore, our goal is to advance this area involving all healers and millions of patients. Most traditional healers are limited by the options of pharmaceutical companies. I have appreciated receiving small grants awarded by some of these companies in the past. They have given me grants knowing the resulting information published was outside their control. It is not true that all synthetic medications are bad, however, some can be dangerous to use and some can be far worse options than those used in functional medicine or by integrative physicians.
On the other hand, the situation could be better if the education on effective dosing, delivery flexibility and risks of many alternative treatments, herbs, etc. were better. Starting with hospitals and traditional medicine, the current approach of removing biofilms using another antibiotic or other patented synthetic agent will fail today or next year in many or some cases. Profoundly unique agents that block signals between the bacteria involved in making the biofilm “fort,” or the use of virus carriers to attack some part of the biofilm, will likely be introduced soon, along with dozens of other advanced options. Much to our detriment, we do not have them now. The FDA approval hurdle is massive and takes many years.
The current treatments offered in integrative, alternative or functional medicine are often too simplistic, but some useful ones you may see are available today. At the other extreme, routine allopathic MD medicine seems to feel that only prestigious schools have solutions right now from multi-million dollar studies—they do not. Even some patients with biofilm infections who are very sick or dying in many traditional hospitals or under routine medical care are frankly “left by the side of the road” to suffer, become disabled or die. Alternative or functional medicine options often result from very poor reasoning based on limited information. The most common trouble might be that treatment “d” or “e” or a mix of treatments “abcdefghijklm” helps Tom or Ann, so they are excited. They have found gold in the backyard, and in their sincere joy, they post this information. When research assistants follow up with these patients in one to three years, they are typically worse. Smart physicians and other healers of any philosophy or training do not appreciate that destroying pathological biofilms is like trying to open a steel door using a banana as the key to a two ton lock.
The limited treatment and supposed cures of many physicians and healers trying to remove biofilms did not take place when checked by long term follow up.
Leslie (along with her sister Tracie) is a hero who founded the 
Today Lyme disease appeared as the top story on CNN.com! This has happened several other times in the past; once for a general Lyme story on CNN and once when President Bush was diagnosed with Lyme diesase. The importance of this time, however, was that the CNN article presented what I consider to be a progressive, accurate, and cutting edge view of Lyme disease; not the antiquated views that CNN has presented in the past. In this way, this was a breakthrogh event.
A virulent and nasty strain of Lyme disease is spreading fast. Not just in the USA, but also in Europe. This strain, known as “OspC type A” Lyme disease, can also adapt to new environements and be carried in varied hosts, much more effectively and easily than other types of Lyme disease.
Most people mistakenly believe Lyme is a physical disorder not related to the central nervous system and brain. In fact, Lyme is primarily a disease of the brain! Yes, PRIMARILY. This fact needs to be more well-appreciated and widely known and accepted.
The state of Massachusetts (MA) has consistently ranked in the top ten states in the US in reported Lyme disease cases; however its numbers are decidedly on the rise. In 2005, for example, MA ranked 4th nationwide in case numbers with 2,341 reported Lyme cases to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), a 46% increase over 2004 numbers. Nationally, the reported cases totaled 23,305, an 18% increase in numbers.
epidemiology per state, this state will rise to the top. In this blog post we will explore a few resources for Lyme sufferers in PA, and also look at the Lyme disease rates in PA per county.
