Ivan - Thanks for posting. You might also find our other forum useful
www.copdliving.com Your doctor gave you something to treat your symptoms, nothing more. I consider prednisone the drug of the devil to be frank with you. It is useful when someone has an exacerbation that nothing else seems to relieve, but doctors hand it out like candy because they don't have anything else to offer COPD patients. You have a few options as I see it. Take control of your own health to begin with. Doctors don't tell you much of anything when it comes to COPD. There are a few good ones out there, but the rest of them need to go back and take a course in COPD 101. Stopping smoking very often makes some people feel worse, but it is one of the best things anyone can do for themselves, especially someone with lung disease. Research is finding out that with each cigarette you smoke, there may be some kind of gene damage as well as the strain you put on your lungs to do the work they were intended to do. Stem cells rush to the point of the latest damage, so a smoker's stem cells are having to deal with smoke damage every time the person smokes. It's a downhill battle for sure.
That being said, you obviously are interested in stem cell therapy which to me holds the most hope of regeneration and reversal of lung disease that there is. COPD is 100% fatal. At this time, there is no cure with conventional medicine, so the best thing is to stop the progression and try to regenerate lung tissue with stem cell therapy. Without adequate clinical trials and patient tracking however, there is no way to tell if patients that report good results from their stem cell therapy have:
A) simply responded to the growth factors in the stem cell "cocktail"
B) had a cardiac problem that they didn't know they had that responds well to the treatment thus improving overall health and breathing
C) decided that stem cells helped them and they now are exercising more and feeling better about life (placebo effect)
D actually had some regeneration from the treatment
E) had the inflammation tamped down which in turn would reduce mucus, improving breathing and diffusion
There are undoubtedly many, many more factors that play a part. I am glad to hear that more doctors are at least asking patients for before records to confirm their lung function and are also doing some follow up work post treatment because without it, everything you read or hear is purely anecdotal. This causes many people to believe that they will respond exactly like someone else that had therapy responded. This is the area that most needs to be worked on in my opinion - getting a therapy that lung patients with similar types of lung damage will respond to universally. Hit and miss is very expensive for patients who are having to pay out of their own pockets for treatment.
In the meantime, you might want to invest in glutathione treatments and a few supplements. Good ones are NAC, Stem Cell Advance, vinpocetine, curcumin/tumeric, fish oil to name a few. I am sure other COPD members have their favorites as well. For those using vinpocetine, I was told to give it 30 days to really see results, always take it with meals and work your way up the first week to 20mg. (10mg x 2 meals). You can go to 30mg as well, but no more than that. This should replace the need for prednisone and it has none of the horrific side effects that prednisone has. If you can find a good doctor, that is open to alternative treatments, always check with your doctor. If you use Coumadin, you may not want to use vinpocetine. If your own doctor will not prescribe glutathione, we have a doctor that participates on this forum that will do a phone consultation and prescribe it for you. Also, invest in a decent oximeter if you don't have one.
COPD is a progressive disease. Start fighting it now and fight it hard or it can get the best of you. I truly believe that a cure is possible with stem cell therapy to work on regeneration and complementary supplementation that will target the triggers of the disease. I am currently involved in a study program that will be providing us all with some answers that are more than anecdotal. The program will focus on clinical trials with publication of the results in peer reviewed scientific journals as well as using the ICMS patient registry. I will keep the forum posted on this as things progress. Serious scientific studies are needed and some clinics are not interested in that. They are far more interested in how many patients they can get in for treatment, building up their bank accounts and caring little about patient outcome. Patients need to ask about post treatment follow ups. If the clinic they are thinking of going to can't provide information for other patients or is vague as to post treatment follow up, then I would choose a different clinic. The difference between cash and real care is great.