A-Bart - any experiences to share

[Hopeny]

DD10 has been on Rifampin/Zith combo for year, other abx for an additional six months. We have been treating Lyme & co, strep & myco. Never had a + test for Bart, however had foot sole pain so we tried Rifampin and stretch came out in the crook of her arm on her arm a few days after starting (she is thin, BMI around 15 I think). Foot (heel, sole) pain went away with a compounded arteminisin but started up again recently and I noticed the marks had become more prominent.

 

We started A Bart and NT detox and switched to Biaxin/Augmentin (she just had a sinus infection and pneumonia as well, and quite a lovely PANS flare to go along with).

 

She has been on A-Bart for about 5 days and I'm like hmmm, no noticeable herx, perhaps she doesn't have Bart....I have read about the A-Bart challenge and was expecting a wallop. So tonight she tells me in a concerned way that she is worried she is going crazy because she has had the following for the past few days (she did not know she was starting a new med, previously I have given her other drops so there is no way she knew), forgetting who people are (her teacher, me - this was one of the symptoms 2 years ago when she was dx'd), nighttime anxiety thinking someone will break into the house, what she describes as OCD, needing to have her pencils lined up in class, needing to have shirts folded etc etc. I questioned her a few times about when it started and she stuck to the past few days.

 

I will call LLD tomorrow but wanted to see what others have done. Seems like I should raise the NT detox drops and maybe go back to 1 drop of A-Bar every other day??? has this happened to you? if yes were you able to continue the protocol?

[NancyD]

My DD has been on A-Bart for about 2 mos and we are seeing some really bizarre things, including paranoia, regression in development (many years!), working memory loss, etc. We are now up to 13 drops twice a day but it's taken us quite a while to get there. I first tried her on A-Bart in April as a challenge and she almost ended up in the ER after 1 drop. I suggest you take it very slowly. We tried MC-Bar-1 a few months ago and the rages were so bad we had to stop. We'll try it again soon -- hoping she'll do better now that she's at top dose with Cumanda and Samento, in addition to Rifampin/Mino. We also have to start arteminisin soon. Did you have much herxing with that?

[Hopeny]

Nancy we had no issues with Arteminisin. Literally in one week her pain was gone, after 15+ months of trying EVERYTHING under the sun including acupuncture, physical therapy, aspercreme, abx etc etc. We used the low dose form compounded with minute doses of ALA and EDTA from Hopkinton pharmacy. Do you wonder if the herbs in A Bart cause those symptoms on their own or if its really a herx? Honestly I am not entirely comfortable with these herbal mixtures. I am going to need to go research everything and see what I can find in Buhners books.

 

Those symptoms/regressions sound severe, do you think it's worth it?

[rowingmom]

DD was taking both A-Bart and A-L for 1.5 years of her 2 year abx treatment.

 

Initial herxing included increased motor/vocal ticcing, pick-like headache, shin pain, foot pain, increased emotional lability. Herxing appeared within 20 minutes of increased dosages. And this was after a previous 6 months of treatment with biaxin/rifampin. She was still suffering from significant decline in executive function at this point, but I don't recall it becoming worse. DD never did have much in the way of problems with memory/anxiety or OCD; just a clinginess to me.

 

DD made it up to dosages of 30 drops BID of both A-Bart and A-L which we were able to maintain for about 8 months while still on abx. At this point we saw the waxing/waning of ticcing etc with pulsed tindamax, but not in between pulses, so she was obviously not reacting to the continuous A-Bart with symptoms.

 

When we weaned abx and started Buhner last April I discontinued A-Bart/A-L as well so as to not mess with the new protocol. After 6 months of the bart protocol I added A-Bart back into the mix (per LLMD) and saw an immediate and similar herx to the previous ones at 2 drops BID. DD has not been able to make it past 4 drops BID.

 

I would think that if A-Bart was going to produce healing, 8 months of 30 drops BID should have done it, but it didn't.

 

DD continues on 1 drop TID, for what it's worth. We have seen much more improvement with Buhner's bartonella/mycoplasma/babesia protocols than with ByronWhite. Just to be fair though we never used the BW detox remedies. Our LLMD recommended homeopathic ones that she said she liked better. Can't say I see any difference on or off of those.

[NancyD]

We are using the same Artemisinin -- from Hopkinton. Good to know you had such great results from that. I really hope we do too!

 

Even though it's awful seeing my DD go through the regressions, I do feel like she's herxing from the A-Bart and I know it's only temporary. It's comforting to know what we thought were symptoms from early diagnosed ASD were really due to Lyme/Bart/PANS (and maybe Babesia). I am seeing much more herxing and better results by adding in the anti-microbials.

 

After I finished treating my Lyme/Bart two years ago I tried the A-Bart challenge and had no reaction whatsoever and I got up to 20 drops BID.

 

Nancy we had no issues with Arteminisin. Literally in one week her pain was gone, after 15+ months of trying EVERYTHING under the sun including acupuncture, physical therapy, aspercreme, abx etc etc. We used the low dose form compounded with minute doses of ALA and EDTA from Hopkinton pharmacy. Do you wonder if the herbs in A Bart cause those symptoms on their own or if its really a herx? Honestly I am not entirely comfortable with these herbal mixtures. I am going to need to go research everything and see what I can find in Buhners books.

 

Those symptoms/regressions sound severe, do you think it's worth it?