The Fluoroquinolone Drugs are the most toxic and dangerous antibiotic in clinical practice today.

The Fluoroquinolone Drugs are the most toxic and dangerous antibiotic in
clinical practice today.
http://www.fqresearch.org/

"JOHN" wrote in message
news
The Fluoroquinolone Drugs are the most toxic and dangerous antibiotic in
clinical practice today.

They're actually one of the safe, more effective antibiotics available
today.

In message Ixhuj.39273$yE1.5879@attbi_s21, Skeptic wrote:
"JOHN" wrote in message
news
The Fluoroquinolone Drugs are the most toxic and dangerous antibiotic in
clinical practice today.

They're actually one of the safe, more effective antibiotics available
today.

In Scudamore's world there is no such thing. Remember,
bacteria don't cause disease so they can't do any good,
but they do cause antibiotic-resistant bacteria that
will depopulate the world. (Both positions cited by
Scudamore on his site and linked from Usenet posts.)

--
| The most important exclamation in science isn't "Eureka!" |
| The most important exclamation is "What the BLEEP?" |
+---------- D. C. Sessions ----------+

On Feb 18, 7:31*am, "Skeptic" wrote:
"JOHN" wrote in message

news
The Fluoroquinolone Drugs are the most toxic and dangerous antibiotic in
clinical practice today.

They're actually one of the safe, more effective antibiotics available
today.

I know you sick of hearing this but thought you would be interested in
the latest from the FDA's AER database concerning how "safe" cipro
is. The adverse reactions reported for cipro were compared to ALL the
adverse reactions reported that quarter no matter what drug was
involved. Out of ALL the reports for that quarter Cipro had more
reports that any other drug in the following adr categories. Since
the majority of the reports found in the AER database are reported by
the drug companies as required by law, rather than an individual
consumer you can forget about your "twelve year old and his
girlfriend" screwing this data:

3rd quarter 2007 MedWatch AER database showed the following adverse
reactions being associated with Ciprofloxacin at a much greater rate
than ALL of the other drugs reported upon that quarter in regards to
the following adverse reactions (highest to lowest):

Arthalgia
Renal failure
Muscle rupture
Nephritis Interstitial
Dyskinesia
Paraesthesia
Rash
Fatigue
Torsade De Pointe
Peripherial Neuropathy
Tendonitis
Insomnia
Myalgia
Rhabdomyolysis
Nephorlithias
Tendon pain
TENs
Tendon Rupture
Muscular weakness
Vision Problems

2nd quarter 2007 MedWatch AER database showed the following adverse
reactions being associated with Ciprofloxacin at a much greater rate
than ALL of the other drugs reported upon that quarter in regards to
the following adverse reactions (highest to lowest)::

Arthalgia
TENs
Multiple organ failure
Myalgia
Tendon Rupture
Torsade De Pointe
Hepatitis
Renal Failure
Renal Failure Acute
Pain in the extremities
Malaise
Rash
Nephritis Interstitial
Convulsion
Tendon Pain
Musculoskeletal Pain
Neck Pain
Tachyardia
Respiratory Failure
Paraesthesia
Hallucination / Delirium
Colitis
Grand Mal Seizures
Peripherial Neuropathy
QT prolongation
Joint Stiffness / Swelling
Vision Problems

1st quarter 2007 MedWatch AER database showed the following adverse
reactions being associated with Ciprofloxacin at a much greater rate
than ALL of the other drugs reported upon that quarter in regards to
the following adverse reactions (highest to lowest):

Renal Failure Acute
Tendon Pain
Nephritis Interstitial
Arthalgia
TENs
Hallucination / Delirium
Tinitus
Tendon Rupture
Rash
Rhabdomyolysis
Nephorlithias
Tendon pain
Myalgia
Anxiety Attacks
Pain in the extremities
Malaise
Paraesthesia
Hematuria
Vision Problems
Liver damage
SJS
Peripherial Neuropathy
Hemolytic Anemia
Renal Vasculitis

As you can see they had more serious adrs reported with their use than
any other antibiotic, or any other drug for that matter, within this
time frame. And I excluded a lot of adrs as the list would have been
unmanageable and concentrated only on those with significant outcomes.

Oh, by the way, the guidelines concerning anal intercourse in my
previous post that you found so amusing was a DIRECT QUOTE from the
guideline source, NOT something that I had written. I was appalled
that you even found this to be amusing. Anal intercourse is practiced
not only by homosexuals but also by some hetrosexuals. So those
guidelines were relevant and not posted for some perverted amusement.
Please don't tell me that your closed mindness extends into you being
homophopic as well. I would hope that you do indeed treat homosexual
patients as well and not exclude them from your practice.

I would be quite curious how many patients you have had over the years
that you have labled as being "Hypochondriacs" or "difficult
patients" who have presented with some the reactions posted above. I
seem to recall in an earlier post that you had stated that they seemed
to complain a lot or were not afraid to complain (something like that
anyhow).

You see I find your judgment regarding what is an adverse reaction to
be rather "suspect". My own urologist had the very same attitude that
you have and denied that my reactions had anything to do with the
quinolones I was on. In the meantime, as he kept giving me stronger
and stronger doses, (for two months, first for a non-existant bladder
infection, then non-existant prostatitis, and then back to a non-
existant bladder infection, when in fact the only thing wrong with me
was an undiagonist kidney stone. The radioligist missed it) while
they were rapidly destroying the nerves and muscles in my eyes,
rendering me blind (permanent double vision), destroying my tendons,
rendering me a cripple, (chronic tendonitis), destroying my hearing
(chronic tinititus) as well as doing a number on my heart, liver and
kidneys. Not to mention irreversible peripherial nueropathy to boot.
Of course if you were to ask HIM these drugs are quite safe and
effective with minimum side effects and of course he had never seen
such reactions in HIS patients before.

Hence the reason I keep on you about this. I would not wish what has
happened to me to happen to either you, or one of your patients, just
because you trust the drug reps that bring you all kinds of goodies
more so than your own patients who I would imagine you consider to be
"Hypochondriacs".

Maybe I am wrong. Double check their records against the above lists
and see what you find.
It might just amaze you. I'd be willing to bet that you will find
numerous complaints regarding muscle and tendon pain as well as a
"burning sensation" not to mention anxiety attacks, confusion,
insomnia, as well as vision and hearing problems that you blew off as
not being associated with the drugs you were prescribing.

"davidtfull" wrote in message
...
On Feb 18, 7:31 am, "Skeptic" wrote:
"JOHN" wrote in message

news
The Fluoroquinolone Drugs are the most toxic and dangerous antibiotic in
clinical practice today.

They're actually one of the safe, more effective antibiotics available
today.

I know you sick of hearing this but thought you would be interested in
the latest from the FDA's AER database concerning how "safe" cipro
is.

REPLY:

What you're not understanding is that all antibiotics have side effects.
All medications have rare side effects. All can cause serious problems.

I reviewed that case report of bilateral ureteral obstruction from cipro.
Seems like it was a real phenomenon in this elderly woman on 24 days of
cipro. Of course, it didn't cause permanent damage and the patient did fine
with no long term renal damage. But in pointing that out, that case report
referenced several other articles. Since you have the original reference
you can also look up the works they referenced. Specifically, there have
been studies done looking at thousands of patients looking for crystalluria
and stones and none were found.

So while the very very occasional odd side effect is possible, it by no
means should be considered a standard side effect - especially that is the
only ever reported event of that phenomenon.

So while the very very occasional odd side effect is possible, it by no
means should be considered a standard side effect - especially that is the
only ever reported event of that phenomenon.

The medwatch database contains numerous reports of such kidney stones
caused by the quinolone drugs. Be that as it may. But this is not at
all what I was talking about. You did read the three hundred
citations concering spontaneous tendon ruptures and irreversible
peripheral nueropathy that I posted did you not? If not why not?
This is what I have such an issue with: blown tendons and fried
nerves. Permanent disability. Not a fricking cipro kidney stone.

How many antibiotics do you use that are capable of such life long
damage to a patient with as little as one pill? Not to mention SJS,
TENs, Kidney and Liver failure and disfiguring "rashes" as we find
with Factive? Fatal hypoglycemia as we see with Tequin? Fatal liver
damage as we seen with Trovan? Fatal cadio events as we seen with
Raxar and soon with Avelox? How many antibiotics can cause severe CNS
and PNS reactions that last a lifetime? Things like toxic psychosis.
This is what I am bitching about. Not stuff that is minor and goes
away when the script is stopped.

With the quinolones this is NOT the case. Such damage continues LONG
after therapy has been discontinued. In a number of documented cases
well over a decade. It has a profound affect on a DNA level. It is
not an adverse reaction to the drug. It is what the drug DID while it
was in the patient's system that is at issue here.

This is what I think YOU are failing to understand. Most drug
reactions abate when you take away the offending agent (the drug) The
quinolones are unique as the adrs are NOT to the drug itself. As the
drug has a direct toxic affect on the organs and trashes them. This
damage is what you see, not a side effect. And such damage creates a
dominoe effect that involves the entire human body. End result is
mutiple organ failure in some cases.

Like Elvis the drug has "left the building" but the damage it caused
while there, continues for years. This is what makes them so damn
dangerous in the hands of ignorant physicians who do not have a clue
regarding this very real risk. (ignorant refering to a lack of
specific knowledge, not meant as an insult) They have never seen such
a drug before that destroys bacteria by altering it's DNA. When there
is no bacteria present then the DNA of healthy tissue is altered
instead.

So what treatment can you offer to offset alteration of a patient's
DNA caused by the quinolone class? None. How do you reverse such
damage? You cannot. Tell the patient to stop the drug? Sorry, far
too late for that. (Other than prevent additional damage). But the
damage has already been done. Stopping the drug will not reverse it.
Stopping the drug will not "unblow' a tendon or "unfry" a nerve
ending.

Now do you understand?

"davidtfull" wrote in message
...
So while the very very occasional odd side effect is possible, it by no
means should be considered a standard side effect - especially that is
the
only ever reported event of that phenomenon.

The medwatch database contains numerous reports of such kidney stones
caused by the quinolone drugs.

Define numerous and were they proven by stone analysis to be stones made of
cipro? Having a kidney stone while taking cipro doesn't qualify.

Be that as it may. But this is not at
all what I was talking about. You did read the three hundred
citations concering spontaneous tendon ruptures and irreversible
peripheral nueropathy that I posted did you not? If not why not?

The risk of tendon rupture is well known and has no novelty for me. This
issue of ureteral stones I found interesting. It's in my line of work.

This is what I have such an issue with: blown tendons and fried
nerves. Permanent disability. Not a fricking cipro kidney stone.

I have issues with anaphylaxis which can lead to death. Much more likely to
see that with, oh, let's say amoxicillin. Or are tendons more important to
you than life?

How many antibiotics do you use that are capable of such life long
damage to a patient with as little as one pill? Not to mention SJS,
TENs, Kidney and Liver failure and disfiguring "rashes" as we find
with Factive? Fatal hypoglycemia as we see with Tequin? Fatal liver
damage as we seen with Trovan? Fatal cadio events as we seen with
Raxar and soon with Avelox? How many antibiotics can cause severe CNS
and PNS reactions that last a lifetime? Things like toxic psychosis.
This is what I am bitching about. Not stuff that is minor and goes
away when the script is stopped.

With the quinolones this is NOT the case. Such damage continues LONG
after therapy has been discontinued. In a number of documented cases
well over a decade. It has a profound affect on a DNA level. It is
not an adverse reaction to the drug. It is what the drug DID while it
was in the patient's system that is at issue here.

This is what I think YOU are failing to understand. Most drug
reactions abate when you take away the offending agent (the drug) The
quinolones are unique as the adrs are NOT to the drug itself. As the
drug has a direct toxic affect on the organs and trashes them. This
damage is what you see, not a side effect. And such damage creates a
dominoe effect that involves the entire human body. End result is
mutiple organ failure in some cases.

Like Elvis the drug has "left the building" but the damage it caused
while there, continues for years. This is what makes them so damn
dangerous in the hands of ignorant physicians who do not have a clue
regarding this very real risk. (ignorant refering to a lack of
specific knowledge, not meant as an insult) They have never seen such
a drug before that destroys bacteria by altering it's DNA. When there
is no bacteria present then the DNA of healthy tissue is altered
instead.

So what treatment can you offer to offset alteration of a patient's
DNA caused by the quinolone class? None. How do you reverse such
damage? You cannot. Tell the patient to stop the drug? Sorry, far
too late for that. (Other than prevent additional damage). But the
damage has already been done. Stopping the drug will not reverse it.
Stopping the drug will not "unblow' a tendon or "unfry" a nerve
ending.

Now do you understand?

See my other post. You have becomely ridiculously / absurdly /
inappropriately fixated on the side effect profile of one medication. You
likely had some personal experience with this particular medication. All
antibiotics have a laundry list of possible harmful outcomes. Sorry, cipro
isn't special there.

On Feb 27, 9:32*pm, "Skeptic" wrote:
. *You have becomely ridiculously / absurdly /
inappropriately fixated on the side effect profile of one medication. *You likely had some personal experience with this particular medication. *

Being blinded and crippled for eight years from cipro, floxin and
levaquin tends to do that to a person, especially when the doctors
responsible tell you it could not POSSIBLY be the drug while the other
dozen or so who are trying to fix this mess (he caused) years later
state the exact opposite.

All antibiotics have a laundry list of possible harmful outcomes. *Sorry, cipro
isn't special there.-

Would of been rather helpful if the urologist had taken the time to
share a few items on that laundry list with me don't you think?
Rather than telling me the adrs I was suffering, which were on that
list, were NOT related to the quinolones I was on?

And I would have to counter that you have becomely "ridiculously /
absurdly / inappropriately fixated" on defending a toxic drug you
consider to be safe, when in fact it is a dangerous drug that has been
crippling patients for years. So probably best that we end this
discussion on friendly terms and just agree to disagree.

It's appears I will never change your mind and surely you will never
be able to change mine. My life as I knew it to be prior to these
drugs is over. There is no fixing this. Permanently disabled.

Funny you should state that tendon rupture is old news. I have a
patient survey form on the research site that visitors fill out and
out of well over 400 responses to date less than 1% indicated that
their treating physician had any knowledge concerning these reactions
and the overwhelming majority of these treating physicians claimed
that such a reaction was NOT even remotely possible with the quinolone
class. Comforting to know that your peers are so well informed. At
least you are part of that rare 1% who at least has a clue.

I wish you well and hope you might have learned something here. Take
care.

btw: Bladder stones usually occur with cipro when the PH is out of
whack. Something to keep in mind for your patients. Glad to know
that you are warning them about blowing a tendon and peripheral
nueropathy. 99% of your peers are not. I know for a fact that the
urologist who ruined my life had no such prior knowledge. If he had I
would not be such a cripple today. But then again this partially my
fault for trusting him to be informed to begin with.

A crucial mistake I will never repeat again.

Good luck to you (as well as your patients) and may God bless.

"davidtfull" wrote in message
...
On Feb 27, 9:32 pm, "Skeptic" wrote:
.. You have becomely ridiculously / absurdly /
inappropriately fixated on the side effect profile of one medication. You
likely had some personal experience with this particular medication.

Being blinded and crippled for eight years from cipro, floxin and
levaquin tends to do that to a person, especially when the doctors
responsible tell you it could not POSSIBLY be the drug while the other
dozen or so who are trying to fix this mess (he caused) years later
state the exact opposite.

All antibiotics have a laundry list of possible harmful outcomes. Sorry,
cipro
isn't special there.-

Would of been rather helpful if the urologist had taken the time to
share a few items on that laundry list with me don't you think?
Rather than telling me the adrs I was suffering, which were on that
list, were NOT related to the quinolones I was on?

And I would have to counter that you have becomely "ridiculously /
absurdly / inappropriately fixated" on defending a toxic drug you
consider to be safe, when in fact it is a dangerous drug that has been
crippling patients for years. So probably best that we end this
discussion on friendly terms and just agree to disagree.

It's appears I will never change your mind and surely you will never
be able to change mine. My life as I knew it to be prior to these
drugs is over. There is no fixing this. Permanently disabled.

Funny you should state that tendon rupture is old news. I have a
patient survey form on the research site that visitors fill out and
out of well over 400 responses to date less than 1% indicated that
their treating physician had any knowledge concerning these reactions
and the overwhelming majority of these treating physicians claimed
that such a reaction was NOT even remotely possible with the quinolone
class. Comforting to know that your peers are so well informed. At
least you are part of that rare 1% who at least has a clue.

I wish you well and hope you might have learned something here. Take
care.

btw: Bladder stones usually occur with cipro when the PH is out of
whack. Something to keep in mind for your patients. Glad to know
that you are warning them about blowing a tendon and peripheral
nueropathy. 99% of your peers are not. I know for a fact that the
urologist who ruined my life had no such prior knowledge. If he had I
would not be such a cripple today. But then again this partially my
fault for trusting him to be informed to begin with.

A crucial mistake I will never repeat again.

Good luck to you (as well as your patients) and may God bless.


***REPLY***

Sorry, I don't know you personally - that said, you could be frankly lying
about your claimed condition. Or, you could be misinformed. Or, you could
just be confused. I don' t know and won't pretend to, but I keep my
opinions of things like safety of a medication to medical fact, not internet
rumor.

That said, just wanted to point out, you commented "bladder stones" above.
Cipro has no association with bladder stones. There is one known case of
ureteral stones that you pointed out. Not bladder stones. Since there is
only one known case, the association to pH you comment on is based on in
vitro data which has not proven to have any correlation in humans.

You stated above,
" I have a
patient survey form on the research site that visitors fill out and
out of well over 400 responses to date less than 1% indicated that
their treating physician had any knowledge concerning these reactions
and the overwhelming majority of these treating physicians claimed
that such a reaction was NOT even remotely possible with the quinolone
class."

Here's a thought - if you want to find out what a doctor knows about a
medication, send the doctor the survey, not ask his patients. How is a
patient supposed to know if his doctor is aware of a certain factoid?

Regarding tendon rupture and my comment that it is "old news" - norfloxacin
was reported (if I recall correctly) to cause this or something close to it
in the early 1980's. I'd say 20 years would qualify as "old news". The
actual risk, as measured in a large study in the UK is 0.32 per 100 patient
years. And that is tendonopathy... less than 1/3 of those patients had a
rupture. So, if I give a 10 day course of cipro, that would be an estimated
risk of less than 0.0001% to have some degree of tendinopathy.

Oh, if only medications were perfect...

If nothing else you are tenascious in your defense of this drug:

Here are a few more studies regarding crystalluria. First reported in
1986, so for more than twenty years, just like the tendon issues,
nobody knows anything about it. Thorsteinsson et al clearly
established such an association in human patients twenty years ago.
Nakano et al established the relationship to bladder stones ten years
later. Both of which cite to urinary pH being a factor. Again I have
hundreds of such studies.

Crystalluria and ciprofloxacin, influence of urinary pH and hydration.
Chemotherapy. 1986;32(5):408-17.
Thorsteinsson SB, Bergan T, Oddsdottir S, Rohwedder R, Holm R.
PMID: 3019613 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Fluoroquinolone associated bladder stone.
Nakano M, Ishihara S, Deguchi T, Kuriyama M, Kawada Y.
J Urol. 1997 Mar;157(3):946. No abstract available.
PMID: 9072608 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

Hammann C, Guelpa G.[Drug-induced calculi]
Schweiz Rundsch Med Prax. 1993 Oct 12;82(41):1129-32. French.
PMID: 8210886 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

BILATERAL HYDRONEPHROSIS FROM CIPROFLOXACIN INDUCED CRYSTALLURIA AND
STONE FORMATION. The Journal of Urology, Volume 164, Issue 2, Pages
438-438 N. CHOPRA, P. FINE, B. PRICE, I. ATLAS

Ciprofloxacin crystalluria
Giovanni B. Fogazzi1,, Giuseppe Garigali1, Claudia Brambilla2 and
Michel Daudon3
Ciprofloxacin can cause crystalluria in alkaline urine (especially at
pH 7.3), both in experimental animals and in healthy human
volunteers after oral or intravenous administration [1-3B2B3].

Acute interstitial nephritis in a cardiac transplant recipient
receiving ciprofloxacin
Luis J. Rosado, MD, Mark S. Siskind MD, Jack G. Copeland, MD

I think this is the study you were referring to and it too is OLD
NEWS. The rates have been shown to be much higher than that since
this six year old study.
Fluoroquinolones and Risk of Achilles Tendon Disorders: Case-Control
Study [van der Linden PD et al. BMJ 2002;324:1306]:. The authors
conclude that this adverse effect shows up in 3.2 cases per 1,000
patient.

"So, if I give a 10 day course of cipro, that would be an estimated
risk of less than 0.0001% to have some degree of tendinopathy."

Really?

Then how do we account for this:

"Arthropathy occurred more frequently in patients who received
ciprofloxacin than the
comparator and was defined as any condition affecting a joint or
periarticular tissue that may
have been temporary or permanent (including bursitis, inflammation of
the muscular or
tendinous attachment to the bone, and tendonitis). The affected joints
included: knee,
elbow, ankle, hip, wrist, and shoulder. Arthropathy, as shown in Table
1, was seen in 9.3%
(31/335) of ciprofloxacin patients at 6 weeks. The rates were 13.7%
and 9.5%, respectively, at 1 year. Arthropathy occurred more
frequently in patients treated with ciprofloxacin than control,
regardless of whether they received IV or oral drug".

Source: FDA Summary of Clinical Review of Studies Submitted in
Response to a
Pediatric Written Request 2004
And these studies were conducted by the manufacturers.
13.7% does not compare to the .32% you are citing.

As such the risk would be about 1 in 10.

"Arthropathy occurred more frequently in patients treated with
ciprofloxacin...The affected joints included: knee,
elbow, ankle, hip, wrist, and shoulder. Arthropathy was seen in
9.3%..."

Yep sure sounds like a safe drug.

Not confused in the least. My diagnosis was confirmed by at least
half a dozen physicians. Rheumatologist, hematologist, gastrologist,
and my orthopedic surgeon. Not to mention my opthanuerologist and
nuerologist.

Permanent diplopia, chornic tendonitis, rupture of the achilles
tendon, destruction of the knee cartilage, reuptured abdominal
muscles, irreversible peripherial nueropathy, liver and kidney cystic
formations, atrophic heart valve, the list is endless. And my medical
bills are rapidly approaching a half a million dollars so far. Have
not been able to fix anything. I am far from being an isolated case
either, my name is "Legions".

Are we not done yet? You are starting to annoy me.