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Originally posted by Trini:
I thought I had once heard something about an herb that acted like an antibiotic. It's been a while & I can't remember. Anyone know of this? Thanks

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Are you thinking of Cat's Claw? My doctor gave it to me for a while. Unfortunately, I had to discontinue it after a month due to the fact that it was giving me diarhea. On the plus side, it did get rid of most of my joint pain.

Also well over half of the antibiotics in use today had natural sources. I feel the natural versions were as effective, if not more effective, with far less side effects.

When I did Dr. Z----'s (rhymes with sang) protocol for Lyme, I used his coptis formula. Unfortunately, I didn't have much of an improvement, although when I stopped it, I went downhill.

Liz28 posted previously that she was using Coptis, among other things. She's doing pretty well, and working now.

Carol

Editing to add, Garlic is a potent antibiotic.

Apparently very few of the herbal antibiotics work on Lyme disease. The Lyme bacteria can't be killed with just one herb and maybe not even with a combo of two or three.

The author says that the herbs he recommends for Lyme should be used together with antibiotics as they will help the antibiotics to work better.

I think if you actually asked Lyme patients, even the ones who believe strongly in herbs and supplements and natural or alternative medicine, most if not all of them treated with BOTH antibiotics and herbs -- maybe not both at the same time though.

I do think some of the herbs mentioned in the "Healing Lyme" book are helping my hubby.

See my post to the Multiple Diseases question where I have listed the herbs and supplements he has found to be the most help.
http://flash.lymenet.org/ubb/Forum1/HTML/036654.html

Bea Seibert

[This message has been edited by seibertneurolyme (edited 14 August 2005).]

Artemisinin has been extremely helpful when combined with mepron and ketek (although not everyone sees improvement with this combination.) Also, cordyceps can be a good energy booster, and Dr. Zhang has something called HH capsules. And garlic is a great idea. Just make sure to get the pure, stinky stuff, not the deodorized version.

While it's very nice of Carol to think of me, the bitter truth is that antibiotics have caused the recent rapid improvement, particularly rifampin and ketek.

Yellow Dock is one of the last herbs in the last 2-3 years thats been found to have antibiotic properites of some kind. i haven't checked into it though.

Some have sworn by it. I tried it once, ONE DROP (90 per day was the suggested dose), and I Herxed!

You may wish to search for it online.

Steph

Artemesia annua (not A. abisythia) is good for babesia, especially combined with mepron + macroloid abx.

Cat's claw is supposedly good for lyme BUT- I suspect it probley works better on babesia- has a quinine-like chemical in it.

Chaparal is used for UTI's and food poisoning- very strong herbal abx but not effective for lyme.

lots of others.

Trini,

golden seal contains berberine, and some naturopaths give it as berbine sulfate.
supposed to be good antibacterial for the blood. berberine can affect heart function.
the heart is one of many affected organs.
low dose ok, but i'd be wary is taking straight berberine sulfate solution, or high doses of goldenseal extract. the dried herb would not likely have as intense cardiac effects.

Trini,

i'm not a doc., but properly brewed, i don't think it would be problematic. Depending on the concentration and the number of drops,an extract would be stronger, and so the potential for a cardiac effect is there, theoretically. if the extract is alcoholic then there may be a flushing sensation, signifying an alc. intolerance due to lyme.

glycerin extract would not produce the flushing.

a naturopath would be the best person to see about using this. if there are serious heart issues, and the naturopath wants to do high dose, i wouldn't follow his or any doc's instructions.