Hi, Wally:
As bilko stated, Ebringer's groups were not pre-filtered to select out the optimistic, placebo-prone population: He could actually measure what was going on and figure out how closely the diet was being followed.
I don't know where you have been looking on line, but we have published many of Ebringer's technical papers and one in particular contains the 9-month graph. I wrote a letter to another AS site which included this information (if you send email
aureq@inreach.com to me, I can send you a copy).
Selecting-out individuals for study as you have suggested would be a very good thing, and I would add that finding those who are very satisfied with their jobs and careers would also be important; some people would not really want to put forth the effort if they then had to avoid disability! But really, catching them young is the best thing because there is then no skeletal damage. We would then produce the
can I do it (eat starch) just until my first hip replacement...? group
[kidding!].
Educating people early enough in just how destructive and dangerous AS can become would be the most useful--if I had seen today's body coming I would have listened much closer to the raw food people and paid closer attention to Giraud Campbell's results (1978) and even many others--but I was ignorant of the starch connection until this board and Ebringer's proof and then support of much earlier work even including those subtle suggestions from Edgar Cayce!
Initially, I had the impression that the mechanism of AS was non-linear (a more complex--positive feedback--relationship between stimulus (starch) and response (flare)), however, going over Ebringer's data on the whole gamut of people attempting his London AS Diet at varying levels it is obvious that any level of abstinence is a good thing. WHETHER USEFUL levels of reduction is another matter. Ebringer's goal was to just reduce the level of damaging NSAIDs required and allow these drugs to work for longer periods before the need to switch to stronger meds. This was accomplished in
most people after one year ALMOST following his LSD; the benefit was proportional to the degree of abstinence. Subsequently, Carol Sinclair found her own way after (quite keenly) figuring out total elimination of starch. After many years now she remains damage-free and symptom-free and the picture of health so that you would question whether she was ever really sick--and question HOW MANY years, too!
Yes, it will work for
everyone with AS but it requires time and more patience than most patients have.
Ok...nobody else wanted to say it!--
NSAIDs make you stupid. There really are two groups--those who can continue to take NSAIDs without causing intestinal damage they notice and those who cannot continue to take these drugs for one reason or another. Certainly, NSAIDs wipe out our ability to notice whether any particular food is provocative or not. GIVE THEM UP FOR A DAY?!!! Are you
serious? Like that very fat woman with severe RA that my chiropractor suggested (after my great results) fasting to--"...you trying to KILL me?"
We used to die of 'consumption'...now we are dying of overconsumption.
You have been a good sport; it never hurts to talk these things over, don't give up on us--
John
A punk stopped me on the street and said: "You got a light Mack?"
