Hello,
my name is Margarete, 53, living in Vienna, Austria, Europe, and i am a new member of this forum.
As an MDS Patient after transition to secondary AML M2 i was transplanted in April 2008. Motivated by my own iron-overload that accumulated 2007/08 during my chemotherapy and the Stem Cell Transplantation i was looking for an alternative iron chelator for me, as i would not get one from hospital actually, because my actual serum ferritin is not more than 1000 ng/ml and i have still immunosuppression and other medicaments that hinder phlebotomy. I read that it might cause extra infections also after stem cell transplantation, if your iron-ferritin is on more than at the normal level. My ferritin after the chemos with 25 transfusions was about 1500 ng/ml, after 16 days of Exjade -then i had to stop for the transplantation - it was about 1200 ng/m. Then i got 8 more packs of erys during the transplantation period. The MRT before the SZT constated, that my liver had already a weaker signalizing/iron overload. Two months ago i had 555 ng/ml ferritin (but the rest of the iron is still in my body), and then i started with one small spoon of soluble wheat grass extract in tea or juice daily. i bought this ordinarily on Ebay in a 1 kg package for 25 Euros plus shipping. Three days ago my ferritin was only 400ng/ml!
I tried the wheat grass because of lack of other iron chelators after i read some wheat grass studies, one with mds patients.
Below i send you the link to the study-abstract. Please notice that on this webpage there is a link "associated presentation" when you scroll down under the abstract. Under this link there you find some presentation slides from one of the authors of this study at the ASCO 2009 which provides extra informations. E.G. it is planned to research for a "school medicine" with the wheat grass components, what will last "miles for miles". Actually Wheat Grass helps not every person in a standardized way like the common iron chelators and so it`s not reliable enough to replace normal iron chelation. But maybe it could help additionally taken?
Please read the study and the associated presentation for your information! Hope this helps in some constellations of transfusion-dependency.
http://www.asco.org/ASCOv2/Meetings/...stractID=33788
Best regards,
Margarete