IPPSO NEWS MAGAZINE

Vol 2 No 9 September 2008 Editors: Mike and Yvonne Isaacson

It is ability that counts, not disability

From the Editor's Desk

In this month's issue, we continue the series entitled "The History of Polio". Through this series, some of you who were not too young when you contracted polio, may remember these tortuous times, the plaster casts used to immobilize your limbs, (which was the accepted medical treatment at the time), the steaming hot towels in which we were wrapped, the anguish of being separated from our parents and the never ending battle to stand upright once again. Learning how to walk with ten pounds of steel on our legs, the dogged determination to succeed against all odds and "join the mainstream" once again. The series will come to an end in the October issue, and in November, we begin a new series on Post Polio Syndrome by Mary-Anne Liethof, a 2007 Churchill Fellow (which she compiled for the Winston Churchill Memorial Trust of Australia) who has kindly given her permission for her paper to be published by IPPSO.

The History of Polio

Social Effects The effects of polio can be found throughout American culture: in the lives of people who survived it, through changes to philanthropy, and in new approaches to the design of everyday objects.

Universal Design



Universal Design, also called Design for All, originated in the 1960s and 1970s political movement to ensure equitable use of public space and facilities for all people. Founders Ron Mace (See picture left) and Ruth Lusher, both of whom had had polio, prodded architects, builders, and designers about inclusion and helped to implement federal guidelines.


In 1946, the Mercury dime was replaced by the familiar FDR dime, which honors President Franklin Roosevelt's leadership in combating polio. The coin was designed by John R. Sinnock, chief engraver at the U.S. Mint. People who had polio were responsible for some familiar household items, such as Milky Way Bars and the children's game, Candy Land.
Fund-raisers for cancer, heart ailments, AIDS, and other diseases have adopted strategies for mass, grassroots giving that were used by the March of Dimes. The first March of Dimes walkathon, WalkAmerica, to obtain funds for research related to premature births and birth defects, took place in San Antonio, Texas, in 1970.

The physical effects of polio often produce bodily differences that require patience and creativity in everyday activities. Where only one leg is affected, one foot is smaller than the other, so you need two pairs of shoes.

Rehabilitation
As people who had had polio matured, they became a political and social force. By pushing legislation such as the 1973 Rehabilitation Act, they helped to bring about a consumer-oriented approach to health and to establish the idea that medical care is a right. Previously, rehabilitation therapy had focused primarily on soldiers and their injuries, aiming "to restore the handicapped to the fullest usefulness of which they are capable," as the National Council on Rehabilitation stated in 1942.

"The goal of total rehabilitation is to teach the physically handicapped person to live not just within the limits of his disability but to live to the hilt of his capabilities."
—Dr. Howard Rusk, 1946

Childhood Immunization
Experience with the polio vaccine encouraged public health officers to think in broader terms. The effectiveness of the Sabin oral vaccine resulted in the Vaccination Assistance Act of 1962, a landmark in public health legislation. It provided the states with 36 million dollars to give free vaccines for polio and other childhood diseases. Coordinated by the Centers for Disease Control, the national effort eventually became the focus of an annual infant immunization week, launched in 1977.

Polio and the Nobel Prize
Over the years, the March of Dimes has funded many research projects related to polio as well as other health issues. For example, twenty-four-year-old James Watson traveled to the University of Cambridge in England on a National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis grant in 1952. There he met Francis Crick and began a scientific collaboration that led to the discovery of the double-helix structure of DNA.... and a Nobel Prize.

In 1963 Jonas Salk founded the Salk Institute for Biological Studies in La Jolla, California. Dr. Richard Rietz recalled that it "introduced open laboratories, modular lab planning, ease of communication between scientists, reconfigurable lab utilities and services, and cantilevered benches."

The March of Dimes

The National Foundation for Infantile Paralysis, later renamed the March of Dimes, was established in 1938 and grew out of the great success of the Birthday Balls for President Franklin Roosevelt. The balls and the foundation, both Roosevelt's ideas, were directed by his friend and former law partner, Basil O'Connor.

The March of Dimes was a grassroots campaign run primarily by volunteers. Over the years, millions of people gave small amounts of money to support both the care of people who got polio and research into prevention and treatment. Those contributions financed Jonas Salk, Albert Sabin, and the other researchers who developed the polio vaccines that children around the world receive today.

Did you know that........

The organization's name came from comedian Eddie Cantor's comment that the donation of dimes from across the country could become a "march of dimes," a reference to the popular March of Time newsreels of the era.

The first March of Dimes poster child was Donald Anderson, in 1946. He is a retired postal worker and lives in Seattle, Washington.

What did a Dime buy in the 1930's?

A copy of On the Banks of Plum Creek, by Laura Ingalls Wilder, in 1937

A copy of Esquire, or LIFE, or The New Yorker, or Cosmopolitan, or Better Homes and Gardens, or Good Housekeeping, or McCall's in 1942

A hot dog in 1945

Two bottles of Coca-Cola in 1945

A bag of popcorn at the fairground in 1948

A one-way subway fare from Times Square to Coney Island in 1948

A cup of coffee in 1950

A pay phone call in 1960



Right..... Elvis Presley being vaccinated by a man and a woman at a fundraiser held for the March of Dimes.

Roosevelt

When Franklin D. Roosevelt contracted polio in 1921, at age thirty-nine, it inspired his interest in medical philanthropy. When he heard about the therapeutic value of the thermal mineral baths at Warm Springs, Georgia, Roosevelt went there and ended up buying the site and creating a foundation in 1927. He persuaded his friend and New York City law partner Basil O'Connor to run it.

After Roosevelt became president in 1933, O'Connor co-coordinated the Birthday Balls that took place on Roosevelt's birthday each January and raised money for the care of polio patients. These were so successful that in 1938 they were merged into one nationwide organization, the March of Dimes.

"Once you've spent two years trying to wiggle one toe, everything is in proportion."
—Franklin D. Roosevelt, 1945

"For a generation, Warm Springs was a community of the handicapped. A permanent population of polios came to live at the Foundation or nearby. Many of these people worked at the Foundation as officials, staff people, and teachers.... New polios saw the old polios as persons with a paralysis pattern similar to their own, living a normal life, functioning as productive human beings. The value of such an example was enormous."
—Hugh G. Gallagher, 1998

"We can never forget that special union of the paradise island set up by Roosevelt and his merry crew who invented joy on earth for those of us fortunate enough to get out of the claws of the doctors in the small grey hospitals around the country and into that wonder.

"I was sick for three days before my parents could get me into town to a doctor. By then, my legs were paralyzed and I had trouble breathing. When I got to the hospital, I went straight into the iron lung right away, and they couldn't start the hot packs and muscle stretching until I came out
Peg Kehret, 1996




A REMINDER.................

Hehehe Corner

I finally got my head together.....now my body is falling apart.

What is a Friend?

From Alma Curry

I have been thinking about friends lately and trying to decide exactly what a friend is. I know as we grew up we had childhood friends and most of them disappeared over the years. And as we grew older we made new ones, some of which also disappeared over time. But what is a true friend? What makes a person qualify as being a "true" friend?

I have been searching the internet for the answers and found these descriptions of what a friend should be. If you have a friend who fits into these descriptions, you are a very rich person.

Friends are a pretty important part of most people's lives. Research shows that having quality relationships increases your likelihood of being happy - so it's good for your happiness to be a great friend and to have a group of close friends surrounding you too. (Even if it is over the internet).

A friend is someone who listens. Someone who tells you the truth about yourself and you listen and appreciate it. Someone you don't want to leave, no matter how much time you have spent with them.

A friend is a person who is willing to take you the way you are. Who will stand by your side even when you are not there in person. Who tells you they will always be there for you... and stays true to their word. Who puts a smile on your face even when you are feeling down. Who can listen to you cry and then make you laugh all in the same conversation. Who loves you for who you are and doesn't care what you're not.

A friend is a person with whom you dare to be yourself. You can say what you think, so long as it is genuinely you. He understands those contradictions in your nature that lead others to misjudge you. With him you breathe freely. He understands. You do not have to be careful. You can weep with him, laugh with him, pray with him. Through it all - and underneath - he sees, knows and loves you. A friend is someone who is there, when the world lets you down. They are people who set aside their needs to let you know they are around. They seem to know when you have sadness in your heart. And they put their own lives on hold, to see what they can do without slight of thought. Should you need a helping hand, just reach out and grab on to your friend. A true friend doesn't expect anything in return. They just want to help.

A friend is not a shadow nor a servant, but someone who holds a piece of a person in his heart. A true friend will feel your presence whether near or far.

My 7 year old granddaughter, Kiersten, summed up what a friend is this past week while at school. She said, "My friend scraped her arm on the playground today during recess and it was bleeding. She was wearing a white shirt so she couldn’t wipe the blood on it,....... so I wiped it on mine".

Wishing you at least one true friend in your life.

Hehehe Corner

If all is not lost..... where is it????

Letters to the Editor

From Shari.........

The section regarding IPPSO's need for money was very heartening as President of IPPSO, I know the other Board member's appreciated it too. At our last Board meeting we asked ourselves why our approximately 400 members did not pay dues. Is $20.00 a year too much to ask? Would they pay a yearly $10, or is our family wondering how we would use the money they would send us? We find it very disconcerting that we have only 20 members who paid dues this last year, which includes the members of the Board. Our new members are now paying dues as we changed the wording on the new membership form and it really helps! We thank those who have helped us financially, yet wonder why most people don't. Even $1.00 a month would make a difference if everyone would do that. $12.00 a year. I have written letters to the members before explaining why we need money. I would really appreciate some feedback from our family as to what we can do to help making paying yearly dues easier for them. If you go to our website http://www.ippso-world.org you will see the tab for dues and donations; there you can pay by Pay Pal or send a check to our treasurer who will send you a receipt. We are a 501 (c) 3 and it is a tax write off.

To be honest, sitting at the head of IPPSO (for 8 years now), paying my dues, bills to keep up my computer, money for conferences, long distance calls, and spending hours keeping IPPSO up and running; leaves me feeling like, "Does anyone really care? Or do they just not understand that we need more help?" I hope you get some letters of response to my questions Mike. There is so much more we would like to do as an organization; yet with limited funds, that is just not possible.

PPS "We're Still Here" Campaign to be October 12-18, 2008

Post-Polio Health International (PHI) challenges individuals and groups from around the world to make the October 12-18, 2008, WE'RE STILL HERE! campaign even more visible than the successful 2007 campaign. The goal is to alert health professionals, policy-makers, and the general public to the fact that polio survivors are active individuals within their communities with successes to tell, and for many, unmet needs.

Focus for 2008

PHI is collaborating with Polio Survivors and Associates (PSA), a Rotarian Action Group, in asking polio survivors and post-polio support organizations to contact the local Rotary Club with an offer to speak during WE'RE STILL HERE! week.

Activities Announced

PHI challenged groups to be creative in designing activities for this year's campaign; the following groups have responded to date.

Manuscript for Post-Polio Players – The brainchild of Vera Moore, Mobile Area Post-Polio Support Group, this fast-moving script of polio survivors chatting before their support group meeting raises post-polio issues in a personal way. The short script, which can be modified to fit any area's history, is easy and fun for groups to produce. Book the production for Rotary meetings, church and community action groups, school assemblies, social interest groups. Schedule a Q&A session after the skit. The script, needing minimal props, set and characters, can be downloaded from the WE'RE STILL HERE! section of www.post-polio.org.

Virtual Workshop – The Polio Society, Washington, DC, is developing a virtual seminar/support group to be offered during the week of October 12-18, 2008. Polio survivors and their loved ones and caregivers will be able to register for this free program by mail or through the Polio Society website. The only cost will be a long-distance phone call to the telephone bridge line. Contact the Polio Society online (http://www.poliosociety.org) or by phone (301-897-8180) for additional details.

Locating local polio survivors – The John P. Murtha Neuroscience and Pain Institute (JPMNPI) and the Rotary Clubs of District 7330 in Johnstown, Pennsylvania, are collaborating to locate and assist area polio survivors. Ideas include a public service announcement highlighting polio history, Rotary's involvement in polio eradication and rehabilitation, and the services at JPMNPI; developing a grant to fund continuing education for Emergency Medical Services Personnel; and a "Post-Polio Walk."

WE"RE STILL HERE! Home Base – Post-Polio Health International's website (www.post-polio.org) is home base for facts, ideas and latest updates on the WE’'RE STILL HERE! campaign and will have links to all participating groups. As plans develop, send them to director@post-polio.org to be added to the WE'RE STILL HERE! section of http://www.post-polio.org.

Hehehe Corner

A closed mouth gathers no feet.

In Appreciation.....

By Liliana Marasco Girado

I extend my gratitude to IPPSO, a nonprofit organization and affiliate, of APPLAC. It is in recognition of its work and achievements that I am publishing this in the IPPSO News Magazine.

To my friend and sister, American Shari Fiksdal, President and Co-Founder of the International Post Polio Support Organization (IPPSO): we have spent many years together, teaching and sharing what we have learned about PPS. Both learning, and if anyone has dedicated themselves to this, it is Shari. The most important aspect of these years together has been to share the cases of the people affected with PPS, and their families, to understand their needs, and the isolation they feel from those nearest to them when a chronic problem with PPS manifests itself. We have realized that it does not matter that the cultures may be different, the pain and the personal problems of a person with polio are intrinsically the same.

Thanks to your being a true friend, we forged unbreakable ties in spite of our different nationalities. IPPSO consists of more than 300 people with PPS where, although differences in race exist, nevertheless we have demonstrated that it is humanity which creates borders, but in human pain borders do not exist, nor can anyone, from one day to the next, live an adverse experience in this world of perennial pain.

Thanks to you, my sister, together we have traveled a road, which helped us both. Most of all, Shari, thanks for always being there whenever I needed you, day or night, whether or not you had more or less pain or fatigue than other days. It was seldom that we disagreed, always analyzing the subject with a high level of knowledge. You always maintained the principle of respect for your neighbor, and although this might have seemed ambiguous, you have always allowed individuals TO BE. I now apply this teaching to everyone, most of all to those who suffer from PPS.

Thank you for accepting me as I am, always saying things to my face, never behind my back. Joining forces to face serious battles in the world of PPS!

Among the leaders of the PPS world, in international conferences and forums, in the end together we achieved something beautiful, made them see and understand that we are all ONE WITH THE WHOLE.

This phrase that I say over and over - Post Polio does not have a nationality - we are united with everyone who holds out his or her hands. They are like brothers and sisters, reconciling countries as far distant as Africa and Alaska, countries of all the other continents, etc. etc.

Shari, you are part of these achievements, you taught me the way. It is exactly 8 years ago next month that we started our cyber wanderings, our encounters at conferences, our chats, and our nights of shared insomnia, both dreaming about our ideals becoming reality. We moved mentally to that beach where you so loved to walk barefoot, the night passed while we gathered the sea shells to make those necklaces: later that became a reality for us.

So much to tell! So I wish good luck to everyone with the sequel of "Polio World." Shari and Lily (as she calls me) will both always be stretching out our hands to increase that chain of love that reaches around the world of PPS.

Disability, my dearest Shari, marks only ONE difference, and in this case the differences of skin color, creeds and political beliefs were overcome by LOVE.

All my best wishes to the pillar of a great organization IPPSO, and to its worthy President, also to all its partners, collaborators and friends of APPLAC.

Lyme Disease

From Alma Curry
Some of the symptoms of Lyme Disease are apparently very similar to PPS............ Ed.

Lyme disease affects different areas of the body in varying degrees as it progresses. It is caused by a tick bite. The site where the tick bites the body is where the bacteria enter through the skin. Initially, the disease affects the skin, causing an expanding reddish rash often associated with "flu-like" symptoms. Later, it can produce abnormalities in the joints, heart, and nervous system.

Lyme disease is medically described in three phases as: (1) early localized disease with skin inflammation; (2) early disseminated disease with heart and nervous system involvement, including palsies and meningitis and (3) late disease featuring motor and sensory nerve damage and brain inflammation and arthritis.

In the early phase of the illness, within days to weeks of the tick bite, the local skin around the bite develops an expanding ring of unraised redness. There may be an outer ring of brighter redness and a central area of clearing, leading to a "bull's-eye" appearance. This classic initial rash is called "erythema migrans" (formerly called erythema chronicum migrans. Patients often can't recall the tick bite (the ticks can be as small as the periods in this paragraph). Also, they may not have the identifying rash to signal the doctor. More than one in four patients never get a rash. The redness of the skin is often accompanied by generalized fatigue, muscle and joint stiffness, swollen glands, and headache resembling symptoms of a virus infection.

The redness resolves, without treatment, in about a month. Weeks to months after the initial redness of the skin, the bacterium and its effects spread throughout the body. Subsequently, disease in the joints, heart, and nervous system can occur.

The later phases of Lyme disease can affect the heart, causing inflammation of the heart muscle. This can result in abnormal heart rhythm and heart failure. The nervous system can develop facial muscle paralysis (Bells Palsy), abnormal sensation due to disease of peripheral nerves (peripheral neuropathy), meningitis, and confusion. Arthritis, or inflammation in the joints, begins with swelling, stiffness, and pain. Usually, only one or a few joints become affected, most commonly the knees. The arthritis of Lyme disease can look like many other types of inflammatory arthritis and can become chronic.

Of note, at the national meeting of the American College of Rheumatology in 2007, it was reported that anxiety and depression occur with an increased rate in people with Lyme disease. This is another important aspect of the evaluation and management of these patients.

Hehehe Corner

The first rule of holes is........ if you are in one, stop digging! (It's so hard to make a comeback if you haven't been anywhere!)

The Price of Children

This is just too good not to pass on to all. Something absolutely positive for a change. I have repeatedly seen the breakdown of the cost of raising a child, but this is the first time I have seen the rewards listed this way. It's nice, The government recently calculated the cost of raising a child from birth to 18 and came up with $160,140 for a middle income family. Talk about sticker shock! That doesn't even touch college tuition. But that $160,140 isn't so bad if you break it down. It translates into:

Still, you might think the best financial advice is don't have children if you want to be "rich." Actually, it is just the opposite.

What do you get for your $160,140?

For $160,140, you never have to grow up. You get to:

You have an excuse to:

For $160,140, there is no greater bang for your buck. You get to be a hero just for:

You get a front row seat to history to witness the:

You get to be immortal. You get another branch added to your family tree, and if you're lucky, a long list of limbs in your obituary called grandchildren and great grandchildren. You get an education in psychology, nursing, criminal justice, communications, and human sexuality that no college can match.

In the eyes of a child, you rank right up there under God. You have all the power to heal a boo-boo, scare away the monsters under the bed, patch a broken heart, police a slumber party, ground them forever, and love them without limits.

So . . one day they will like you, love without counting the cost. That is quite a deal for the price!!!!!!!

Love & enjoy your children & grandchildren!!!!!!!

Hehehe Corner

The only time that the world beats a path to your door is when you are in the bathroom.

Another Look at Post Polio Syndrome

Post-Polio Syndrome (PPS) has been a recognized condition for a long time, with (believe it or not!) reports of similar symptoms going back to the 1800's. But we still don't know the exact cause, or causes, of PPS! We do not know how many polio survivors will develop PPS, (some people think that it ranges from 20% to over 80%) and we don't know why some polio survivors develop PPS and others do not. There is no single diagnostic test and PPS remains a diagnosis arrived at after exclusion of other quite similar conditions. We do not understand why there is a time lag between recovery from the acute attack and development of symptoms severe enough to compromise our quality of life. In fact, there is very little that we do understand about PPS. If we can finally discover the underlying cause(s) of PPS; if we can find out what is happening at the cellular and even sub-cellular level, we may then be able to answer all of these perplexing issues. There is also promise of being able to treat and possibly even prevent the onset of many, perhaps most of, the PPS symptoms. Little research has been done on PPS, probably because polio survivors are a dying breed. After world wide eradication of polio, the 'lifespan' of PPS will be equal to that of the youngest living polio survivor.
Or will it? Poliomyelitis continues to cause paralysis although now the virus causing the illness is not the original polio virus but the West Nile Virus, or enterovirus 71, or one of several Coxsackie viruses. The nerve damage caused by these viruses is identical to that caused by the polio virus and therefore it is likely that PPS, perhaps by then called Post-Viral Syndrome, will continue to bring limitations to survivors many years after they thought they had recovered. So it remains important to examine the underlying cause of new muscle weakness, central fatigue, pain, memory and word finding problems and other symptoms that accompany PPS. Fortunately, current research in other areas holds great promise for explaining what is happening to so many polio survivors. The cause of virtually all PPS symptoms can be explained by the word: inflammation!
Research in the fields of neurology, immunology, physiology and virology is finally coming together and the many pieces of the puzzle are being laid upon the table. A good analogy is to think about a jig-saw puzzle. When you dump a 1000 piece puzzle out of the box, some pieces land right side up, others upside down. There is little hope of assembling the puzzle until you turn all the pieces right side up, right?. Then, the next step is to put all the straight edged pieces in a pile and assemble the outer edge of the puzzle to give you a general outline. After this it is helpful to group pieces with similar patterns or colors together, right? Well, this is where we are today in our understanding of how inflammation is related to almost all chronic diseases; PPS, MS, ALS, CFS, Parkinson's, irritable bowel syndrome, arteriosclerosis and many others. Now you some idea of how far we have to go to get a complete picture!
Let's look at the puzzle pieces that seem to belong to PPS. Inflammation has two major causes; either injury (which includes viral and bacterial infection, cuts, strains, operations, etc.) and stress - including major events such as death of a relative, divorce, and job loss, but also including milder, repetitive stress that is encountered every day. In a person with PPS, when the body suffers an injury, such as physically overdoing things, the first reaction is for the cells in the affected area to release a chemical called proinflammatory cytokine, which tells specialized cells, whose job it is to protect you from invading organisms, to come to the site of the injury. At the same time the proinflammatory cytokines activate resident cells and cells that have migrated to the injury and all of them produce more proinflammatory cytokines setting up a cascade of events that will involve the entire body. Two proinflammatory cytokines, Interleukin-1 and Tumor Necrosis Factor-a, are especially important in triggering an acute immune response, the body's first line of defence. The acute immune response involves developing a fever, fatigue, loss of appetite, sleepiness and other symptoms. It goes away within a few days. However if the injury is repeated often – say when a person with PPS persists in exercising a stressed out muscle, then a chronic immune response will set in. This response to chronic stress involves the entire body including the brain and it will produce central fatigue, new muscle weakness, problems with short term memory and word finding, irritable bowel syndrome and other symptoms.
These are the post-polio syndrome symptoms that we are all so familiar with. There are many research papers that document what happens in the body after activation of the immune system by proinflammatory cytokines, and that eventually results in symptoms identical to those of PPS.
Let's take a look at how proinflammatory cytokines might be the underlying cause of new muscle weakness. We begin with acute polio and the death of a large number of nerves whose job was to innervate muscles by telling the muscles to contract or relax and thereby allowing you to move a limb. If all the nerves leading to a leg or arm died, the limb is paralyzed.
However in many people, original paralysis or severe weakness eventually disappeared, voluntary movement was restored and you could once again use your arm or leg. The body developed a neat trick to allow this to happen. The surviving nerves sent out 'neuronal sprouts' to attach to and innervate muscles that had been orphaned when the nerve originally attached to them died off. Thus the surviving nerves were able to activate not only the muscle that they always innervated, but also surrounding muscles creating something called a "motor unit." This repair was essentially stable for many years. However 30 or more years after recovery from polio, many people begin to experience new muscle weakness. Often the weakness is in the 'good' arm or leg. This may be due to the fact that the 'good' arm or leg was used more than the "bad" one.
Clearly something happened to the neuronal sprouts; either they no longer could maintain full time attachment to the motor unit or else they may have died off completely. This caused the appearance of new muscle weakness. But. this is a description of what is happening, not an explanation of why it is happening. Researchers have established that proinflammatory cytokines cause cells to release neurotoxic proteins. These neurotoxic proteins can damage or even kill neurons by a number of mechanisms including changing the outer membrane of the nerve cell resulting in cell death or increasing reactive oxygen inside the nerve cell which also leads to cell death. It is probable that the neuronal sprouts, that have served so well for so long, are more fragile and may be the first target of proinflammatory cytokines in the central nervous system.
A very important fact is that nerve death only occurs in an activated immune system. So the next question is "Do people with PPS have an activated immune system?" YES! They do. There have been a number of research papers indicating that polio survivors with PPS symptoms have an activated immune system while polio survivors who do not report PPS symptoms do not have an activated immune system. A very recent research paper looked at cytokines in people with PPS, polio survivors without PPS, people with multiple sclerosis (MS), a well known inflammatory neurological disease, and people who had no neurological problems at all. They found that people with PPS and MS have proinflammatory cytokines in their central nervous system while polio survivors who do not have PPS and people without neurological problems do not have proinflammatory cytokines in their central nervous system. So the question is, what causes the presence of these proinflammatory cytokines in people with PPS? One hypothesis is the presence of very low levels of polio virus RNA hiding in nerve cells. This polio virus RNA is not capable of infecting you or other people, but is capable of triggering the production of proinflammatory cytokines and with that, an underlying state of chronic immune system activation.
Other researchers have demonstrated a connection between the presence of proinflammatory cytokines and central fatigue. Psychological stress – the kind that doesn't involve overdoing physically – is perceived in the brain and the brain produces proinflammatory cytokines. This can cause profound fatigue, inability to concentrate and other symptoms.
Remember that 1000 piece jigsaw puzzle? Well, we are now able to put together some of the same colored pieces to make small pictures that are part of the larger picture. In the same way, we are piecing together what happens when a person with PPS experiences physical or psychological stress. We start to see small pictures and we can just begin to discern the larger picture coming together.
We are coming to the place where it may be possible to treat PPS symptoms using anti-inflammatory medications. A trial, using intravenous immunoglobulin treatment, is currently underway in Sweden. Preliminary trials of this treatment in people with PPS have yielded dramatic improvements in fatigue and muscle strength. Other treatments to reduce PPS symptoms may be based upon traditional anti-inflammatory medicines such as aspirin, ibuprofen, indomethacin and others. All treatments would have to be done under the supervision of your doctor, but in the meantime, there are some things you can do that are known to minimize inflammation in the body – and with that you might have a reduction of PPS symptoms. Try meditation. Yes! It works... if you do it consistently. Appropriate exercise, under the guidance of a knowledgeable physiotherapist, will definitely lower inflammatory cytokine levels. Pace yourself and don't overdo things. This is easier said than done but if you understand that overusing muscles will start the pro-inflammatory cascade of events and with that bring on or intensify PPS symptoms, perhaps you will be able to justify resting before you go too far.
Adipose tissue – commonly known as fat – is also a producer of inflammatory cytokines. If you needed a good reason to lose weight, here it is. Finally there are a few other things you can try.
Drinking green tea encourages weight loss and it has neuroprotective qualities. There are also reports that undenatured whey protein may be beneficial. These things are probably not as effective as direct medication, but as we incorporate them into everyday life, they could well result in positive benefits. It is worth trying anyway!!

A Final Hehehe

Lead me not into temptation........ I can find the way all by myself!