
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: FRIDAY, September 24, 1993                   TAG: 9309240089
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-3   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: Newsday
DATELINE:                                 LENGTH: Medium

CHICKEN-BONE EXTRACT PROPOSED FOR ARTHRITIS

A new, non-toxic treatment based on extracts from chicken bones seems to alleviate the painful and disabling symptoms of rheumatoid arthritis, a team of doctors in Boston reported Thursday.

The treatment "could be the first really safe therapy that is effective" against the joint-destroying ailment, said Dr. David Trentham, a rheumatologist at Beth Israel Hospital and the Harvard School of Medicine. About 2.1 million Americans have the disease, according to the Arthritis Foundation.

The Boston study, in which 30 patients got the treatment, "is very important, exciting and encouraging," said Dr. Arthur Grayzel, vice president for medical affairs at the Arthritis Foundation. But "it's a study with a relatively small number of people [treated] for a relatively short period of time. It needs to be repeated with larger numbers of patients for longer periods of time."

In rheumatoid arthritis, natural collagen within joints is gradually destroyed, apparently because an immune-system attack floods the area with tissue-destroying white blood cells.

In the proposed new treatment, patients drink orange juice mixed with purified collagen extracted from chickens' cartilage and bone. The idea is not to replace the lost protein, but rather to stimulate a natural mechanism that tones down the white blood cell attack on the patient's own collagen.

"What is exciting about this approach is that we are stimulating the body's own natural regulatory mechanisms" to combat the disease, said Dr. Howard Weiner, a neurologist leading the study. "What is also exciting is that there appear to be no toxic side effects."

Autoimmune diseases arise when a person's main line of defense, the immune system, is somehow stimulated to attack vital tissues within the body.

Giving the treatment orally is important, the researchers said, because collagen molecules that enter the body via the intestinal tract somehow stimulate production of special "regulatory" cells. These migrate to the joints and secrete a hormone-like substance, halting the immune attack, Weiner said.

This approach, called "oral tolerization," is also applicable to other autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis, diabetes and myasthenia gravis, the researchers said.

by CNB