Hey Pete,

Merry Christmas... Welcome to CH.com and the anti-inflammatory regimen.  Your response to this regimen will only get better as indicated by the following chart based on data from the online survery of 187 CHers taking this regimen to prevent their CH.  It illustrates their response by day after start of regimen.

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It's gifts like this that make Christmas Very Merry and the New Year Very Happy...

Take care and please keep us posted.

V/R, Batch

Hey Pete,

Happy New Year and thanks for the update. Colds and allergies can and will impact the anti-inflammatory regimen's capacity to prevent CH. 

The reason is simple, our immune systems take priority in the consumption of serum vitamin D3, its first metabolite, 25(OH)D and likely the enzymes needed to hydroxylate vitamin D3 to 25(OH)D and from there to 1,25(OH)2D3, the genetically active vitamin D3 metabolite.

Once you've been on this regimen for 3 to 6 months and built up your 25(OH)D reserves, respiratory infections and colds will become scarce as hen's teeth and horse feathers.  What few you do get will be short lived.

What you can do at this point if your cold symptoms are still present is to start taking vitamin C.  I start taking 1000 mg of vitamin C every hour during the day and drink plenty of water at the first sign of a cold.  I continue taking the vitamin C until the cold symptoms are gone.  I also up my zinc intake. 

If you're wondering where this suggested cold treatment came from, the answer is Linus Pauling.  He had many critics of his claims that vitamin C treats colds effectively, treats cancer and prevents atherosclerosis (mostly from Big Pharma).  However, he had two more individual Nobel Prizes (Chemistry/Quantum Mechanics - 1954 and a paper that stimulated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty - 1962) than any of his critics.  Moreover, when he died at the age of 93, he had outlived most of his critics...

A cup of hot chicken soup a day will also help. It turns out that temperatures of 39.5º C (103º F) and higher cause a 1000-fold reduction in adenovirus (the virus responsible for colds) replication in the mouth, throat and esophagus.

If you're battling an allergic reaction, the generic Dyphenhydramine at 25 to 50 mg/day should do the trick after a day or two.  When I suspect an allergic reaction I'll take Dyphenhydramine for at least a week.

Regarding an up-tic in the frequency of your CH after starting this regimen...  It happens to roughly 5% of CHers.  This is a curious phenomenon I suspect is caused by an imbalance of the enzymes needed to hydroxylate vitamin D3 to its genetically active metabolite.  Fortunately, this up-tic in CH frequency usually lasts less than a week if you're still on one of the vitamin D3 loading schedules.  Hope this helps.

Take care, have a Happy PF, healthy New Year and please keep us posted.

V/R, Batch

Hey Pete.

Thanks for the update.  It sounds like you're making progress in controlling the CH beast.

You're at the target 25(OH)D serum concentration... but the present "bug" may have your immune system gobbling up vitamin D3 and 25(OH)D at a high rate.  Accordingly, I would stay at the loading dose for another 3 to 5 days then drop back to the maintenance dose of 10,000 IU/day.

I would schedule the next lab tests for serum 25(OH)D, total calcium and PTH after you've been on the maintenance dose for at least a month.  That should let everything reach an equilibrium and stabilize.

Take care and please keep us posted.

V/R, Batch

Hey Pete,

Sorry you're not responding to the anti-inflammatory regimen even with your 25(OH)D serum concentration on target near 200 nmol/L.  Do you have oxygen handy as an abortive?

If you're taking all the vitamin D3 cofactors, this is an indication there's likely one or more comorbid conditions interfering with the capacity of vitamin D3 to prevent your CH.

Given your present situation, here's a check list of things I would try:

(1) A 25(OH)D serum concentration of 200 nmol/L may not be high enough.  I would take 50,000 IU/day vitamin D3 for four (4) days then drop back to a maintenance dose of 15,000 IU/day for a week then down to 10,000 IU/day.  This should elevate serum 25(OH)D from 200 to 250 nmol/L and that should help prevent CH.

(2) 3-Month Course of Vitamin B 50 Complex...  Have you started it? If not, I would do so.  A deficiency among the seven B vitamins can cause problems.  The 3-month course vitamin B 50 complex should take care of any deficiencies in this area.

(3) Benadryl (Diphenhydramine HCL)...  Have you tried it.  If I suspect an allergic reaction, I take Children's Liquid Benadryl (Diphenhydramine HCL) at 12.5 mg in the morning and another 12.5 mg in the evening.  Allergic reactions cause a flood of histamine that interfere with nearly all CH preventatives by triggering the release of CGRP and other inflammatory agents in neurons throughout the brain and in particular, the trigeminal ganglia.  Benadryl (Diphenhydramine HCL) is a first-generation antihistamine that crosses the blood brain barrier to block H1 histamine receptors on neurons throughout the brain.  Blocking the histamine H1 receptor stops the triggering mechanism that releases CGRP and that gives vitamin D3 the opportunity to do its thing through genetic expression.  If there's no change in CH patterns after 4 to 5 days, the problem may not be an allergy so stop taking the Benadryl.

(4) Vitamin C...  I take a 1000 mg tablet every 2 hours during the day if I suspect an infection.  Vitamin C is a potent antiviral and antibacterial agent.  In the event you have a sub-clinical infection, (no obvious or outward symptoms), vitamin C can usually help the immune system stop the infection in 2 to 3 days

(5) Curcumin...  I've taken 500 mg once a day with meals to help vitamin D3 prevent my CH.  Curcumin (turmeric) is another potent anti-inflammatory agent that can increase the effectiveness of vitamin D3 as a CH preventative.

(6) Probiotic...  Our GI tracts contain friendly symbiotic colonies of bacteria called the microbiome.  The microbiome helps in digestion and forms a major part of our immune systems.  If I've been prescribed an antibiotic, it has most likely killed most of my microbiome...  so it needs to be replaced.  I do this by taking a good probiotic daily as directed on the bottle until the bottle is empty.  The microbiome also likes to eat fermented vegetables like Sauerkraut and Kimchi...

Hope this helps.

Take care and please keep us posted.

V/R, Batch