Episode Transcript
[00:00:01] Speaker A: Welcome back to Integrative lyme Solutions with Dr. Karl Feldt.
[00:00:05] Speaker B: I am so excited about the show.
[00:00:07] Speaker A: That we have ahead of us.
[00:00:08] Speaker B: We have some phenomenal information that could save lives. You're gonna need to tune in to what's going on today. The information is jam packed, so don't step away.
[00:00:24] Speaker C: Hello.
[00:00:24] Speaker D: Thank you so much for joining Integrative lyme Solutions with Dr. Karl Feld. I am your host, Dr. Michael Karlfeld. I've been in clinical practice since 1987. I've seen pretty much everything under the sun, worked with so many different Lyme patients, and I know what a devastating disease this is. That's why I'm doing this podcast to make sure that you are armed with the information that you need in order to be able to be successful in your struggle with Lyme. We'll be featuring authors, doctors, professors, and also people like yourself that have gone through the journey that you're going through, that have been where you've been and is now on the other side. And they get to tell their victorious story as to how they battle Lyme so that you can implement that in your life as well. Be sure to like us and write a review on whichever platform that you're listening on. What that does is it enables other people to see us more so that they have access to this information as well. So I'm so excited that you're tuning in and get ready for this upcoming show. It is going to be amazing.
[00:01:40] Speaker C: Well, Dr. Ian White, I'm so excited to have you on this segment. You're an expert in the arena of stem cell therapy, so I want people kind of get to know you a little bit. So I mean, you've been dealing with this for 20, 20 years, so. Dr. White is considered a leading expert in the field of aging and regenerative medicine with 20 years experience working with stem cells, regenerative cells and tissue regeneration. Dr. White received his BS and Ms. From Liverpool University, England prior to being hired at Dartsmurth College to study the genetics of gamete biology. From there, Dr. White was recruited to Harvard University to work with hematopoietic stem cells and immune cell biology where he co authored several high impact, peer reviewed scientific manuscripts on the subject. Dr. White went on to receive his PhD from the Answer Stem Cell Institute, Division of Regenerative Medicine at Cornell University. Subsequently, Dr. White relocated to the Interdisciplinary Stem Cell Institute at the University of Miami's Miller School of Medicine where he published groundbreaking research on the role of peripheral nerve signaling in cardiac regeneration. Dr. White currently sits as the CEO and CSO of Neobiosis, a perinatal regenerative tissue research and manufacturing CDMO facility, and serves as the vice president and member of the Board of Directors of the American College of regenerative medicine. Dr. White is the co founder of the Space Aging Research Institute. Space aging. So I'm curious, why did you go there? I mean, what's that?
[00:03:32] Speaker B: Well, it's quite fascinating actually, because what we found is that we age differently in space. So with all the astronauts and cosmonauts that have been returning from space, we've been finding these aging markers that are elevated. And in fact, we've been doing a lot of research using microgravity and actually actual space travel to demonstrate that cells become senescent and cells age more rapidly in space. And so we're starting the Space Aging Research Institute because it's a space age. We're in the space age and we're studying aging and we're using space as a, as a tool because of course, we've been studying aging on this planet for a long time, but we're kind of limited by the resources that we have to study it. And research really isn't progressing as fast as we'd like. And we have this amazing tool very close by and accessible now, which is space to study in a unique way, in a way that we haven't studied aging before. So there's a new X Prize that's, that was just launched or just announced this week, which is very exciting, and it's focused on healthspan. So the Space Aging Research Institute hopes to be a competitor in, in the upcoming X Prize to try to increase longevity of the, of the human species by an additional 20 years.
[00:04:50] Speaker C: Is this the challenge? What is that, Peter? Diamantus? Is that, Is that the challenge?
[00:04:55] Speaker B: That's right, yeah. So the original X Prize essentially birthed the modern space race. So we have, you know, Blue Horizons, we have Virgin Galactic. All these firms were sort of born out of this initial X Prize. It was a $10 million prize, and now we have a $101 million prize for improving healthspan. So we're excited to be part of that.
[00:05:18] Speaker C: Well, that would be a driving force. $101 million. Yes.
That would be good influx for research, I would assume.
[00:05:26] Speaker B: Well, we're hoping that it's going to sort of balance out the need for capital. So, you know, capital will have to come in to drive the research. But then, you know, there's a, there's an upside to it. Any products we develop, any IP we develop along the way will be accessible by the investors. But then also we have the potential for the prize, which would be split by anybody who comes on board with us.
[00:05:46] Speaker C: So because anti aging, I mean, people, they live longer and we obviously want to figure out how to live longer. And you know, we have models around us where, where other species live longer. And I don't know, in space, do we live longer or shorter? It seems like we, yeah, shorter.
[00:06:07] Speaker B: We faster. So we would technically live shorter, which is a major problem if we want to set up bases on the moon or if we want to travel to Mars. We need to tackle this issue of accelerated aging and come up with some countermeasures that would prevent it or even hopefully in our case, reverse it.
[00:06:25] Speaker C: So, so what is, what is your focus in regards to this aspect? You know, what, what, what, where are you looking to find solutions?
[00:06:35] Speaker B: Well, we're looking to nature. That's what we do at Neobiosis, and that's what we've always done, is look to nature for help and for answers. Because, you know, nature's been doing this a lot longer than we have. And you know, if we look at the field of regenerative medicine, there is a lot to learn from just looking at nature. How does, how has nature evolved strategies to regenerate tissue? So we focus exclusively on birth tissues because birth tissues are these amazing resources that provide the raw materials, the instructions and the raw tools for the body to repair itself. So I'm very interested in looking at nature to understand how do we fix ourselves, what goes wrong with aging and what can we do to reverse that. Again, exclusively looking at nature, you mentioned that there are a lot of species out there that have been able to uncouple chronological aging from biological aging. So I believe there's a lot of clues there that we haven't yet fully investigated. And that's one of the areas we'd like to do some research.
[00:07:37] Speaker C: And so with that, I mean, right now, I mean, you're an expert and in stem cell technology, I know you, you've. I mean, obviously with that you have, you know, like exosomes is another category that's also the regenerative.
What are, what are some other categories that come along with that? And then I would like to get into them a little bit more in detail so people understand what they are and, and how they can benefit from that.
[00:08:05] Speaker B: So the term stem cell is sort of a misnomer. People are used to using that term just like they used to using the term Kleenex. For describing tissue paper or hoover to describe a vacuum cleaner. So stem cell has become this catch all term for anything regenerative. And in fact, most of the products that we use in regenerative medicine don't contain any stem cells at all. And they're actually unnecessary. In the field of stem cell biology, where I received my PhD, we use STEM cells to differentiate them into tissues that we would then potentially use for regenerative medicine. But we don't actually use the stem cells themselves directly. But what we do is we use these maturer cells, these cells that are found in the amniotic fluid or the cord blood or other tissues in what's typically considered medical waste, this birth, this birth tissue. And we use those to stimulate the endogenous stem cells. So the stem cells that are found inside our body, inside our lungs, inside our skin, we stimulate those with the raw materials and the instruction manuals, and we're able to get a regenerative response more like we did when we were younger versus older, when we progressively lose that ability to heal and regenerate.
[00:09:21] Speaker C: So because when people think of stem cells, you think, well, I have, you know, a joint or I have, you know, a tissue that I'd like to regenerate. And so we think then stem cells, where they can become anything. So I want to infuse some stem cells and then it's going to become this tissue. But you're saying that that is not true?
[00:09:42] Speaker B: That is not the case? No. There's no evidence in the literature that definitively supports the idea that when you give regenerative medicine, when you give cells extra.
If we. Sorry. If you give exogenous cells. So cells from another source, the transplanted cells, there's no evidence to suggest that they differentiate or engraft into the tissue at all. But what they do is they provide a supportive mel. So an environment in which the endogenous stem cells or the endogenous tissue can respond and repair itself. So the tissues don't engraft and differentiate. What they do is they signal to the cells inside your body and give them some clues as to how to fix themselves.
And exosomes. And the way they do that typically is by liberating exosomes, which contain the instruction manuals and the building blocks that the cells need.
[00:10:38] Speaker E: Hello, dear listeners, this is Dr. Michael Karlfeld, your host of integrative lyme solutions. Today I'm excited to share an exclusive opportunity from the Karlfeld center, where we blend healing power of nature with groundbreaking therapies to combat lyme disease. And its associated challenges. At the Karfeld center, we're not just fighting Lyme, we're revolutionizing the way it's treated with cutting edge therapies like photodynamic therapy, full body ozone IV therapy, silver IVs, brain rebalancing, autonomic response testing, laser energetic detoxification, and more. We aim to eradicate Lyme. Our approach is comprehensive, supporting your body's immune system, detoxification processes, hormonal balance and mitochondrial health, ensuring a holistic path to recovery. Understanding Lyme disease and its impact is complex, which is why we're offering a free 15 minute discovery call with one of our Lyme literate naturopathic doctors. This call is your first step towards understanding how we can personalize your healing journey, focusing on you as a whole person, not just your symptoms. Our team, led by myself, Dr. Michael Karlfields, is here to guide you through your recovery with the most advanced diagnostic tools in individualized treatment plans and supportive therapies designed to restore your health and vitality. Whether you're facing Lyme disease head on or seeking preventative strategies, we're committed to your wellness. Take the first step towards reclaiming your health. Visit us at thecarlfulthcenter.com or call us at 208-338-8902 to schedule your free discovery call. At the Karlfield center, we believe in healing naturally, effectively and holistically. Thank you for tuning in into integrative lyme solution with Dr. Karlfield. Remember, true health is not just the absence of disease, it's achieving the abundance of vitality. Let's discover yours together.
[00:12:39] Speaker C: So when you are doing all the research like on a mouse heart or something like that, and you wanted to regenerate it, were talking about that you had to then differentiate them first. So then you can take stem cells and differentiate them so that they are then cardiac or heart stem cells. So that if you do that process then then they replicate or still no.
[00:13:06] Speaker B: So sort of, yeah. So there are no canonical stem cells in the heart according to the literature. But what's interesting is the heart can sort of repair itself, especially right after birth. There's a two day window where the heart has this capacity to regenerate, but then it loses it and then you only get about a 1% turnover per year for your lifetime. So the activity in the heart is very, very limited. But what we can do is we can take embryonic stem cells and we can differentiate them to epicardial cells. And these epicardial cells are the cells that usually cover the heart, a single layer that covers the heart. And what we found in my own research and the research of others is that it's the epicardium that drives the regenerative response in the heart. And especially if we're looking at something like the zebrafish or a newt, that retains the ability to heal the heart if you, if you damage the heart, those species can actually repair the heart into adulthood. And we see the same phenomenon in neonatal mice. So if we damage the heart of a neonatal mouse for those first couple of days, it's able to repair, and it does so by activating the epicardium, which then migrates into the area and then draws cardiomyocytes from other locations into that site to repair the tissue. So it's not like we're differentiating into a cardiac cell. What we're doing is we're differentiating into the effector cell, which is the epicardium. And that effector cell, that epicardial cell, is driving the regenerative response.
[00:14:35] Speaker C: That's fascinating. So, and you were talking about, in regard to, you have then the exosomes. And so when you don't call them stem cells, what do you call them? I mean, I know the term like msc. Yeah, Used to be mesenchymal stem cells, but now they, they use MSC as another.
Yeah.
[00:14:55] Speaker B: We were arguing for a long time with Dr. Kaplan that MSCs are not canonical stem cells. They don't retain the functions of stem cells in vivo inside the body. Now, you can differentiate them in a petri dish, but you can differentiate almost any cell in a petri dish with the right conditions. So for a long time, MSCs were thought to be stem cells. And just recently, actually, Dr. Kaplan has agreed that these cells are not canonical stem cells and published a paper suggesting an alternate name, which is mesenchymal signaling cell, because that's what they do, is they signal to other cells in the body. And so a lot of people in the space of regenerative medicine are using MSCs or their progeny. It's not really their progeny. It's a bit. That's a bit of an inaccurate statement. But just for simplicity, the product from mscs that are used in regenerative medicine are MSC derived exosomes. Now, almost every cell in the body produces exosomes, but there's a push in the field of regenerative medicine right now to look at the medicinal effects of MSC. Sorry, exosomes derived from MSCs. And what these exosomes do is they encapsulate instructions in the form of RNA and proteins and lipids. And those instructions sort of operate like a UPS parcel and transport information from the MSC to the target cell, deliver that information, and then that cell can utilize the raw materials, the building blocks and the instruction manual to try to fix itself.
[00:16:29] Speaker C: So can clarify again. So the exosomes, they're more kind of like a signaling. They contain then the information in itself.
They don't contain the raw material per se, but they will then draw the raw material to that location in order to do.
[00:16:48] Speaker B: Yeah, they actually do contain a lot of the raw materials, a lot of the lipids and lipids are required to make new cells. They also contain a lot of proteins, signaling proteins that help the cell, the target cell, understand how to fix itself. And then the rna, which is like the instruction manual, the cell is able to read it and understand and make new proteins that instruct it. So when MSC comes on the scene and is able to sense in the environment there's inflammation, it can make exosomes just like little packages, little parcels, and send them out. And they have receptors on their surface which are able to find inflammation. And those receptors bind a target cell and then deliver the cargo, deliver the package to the cell which is then able to use it as if it's like getting an emergency ration, an emergency package and it's able to use those resources to fix itself.
[00:17:43] Speaker C: I would assume that the information that the instruction manual so to say, would be different for like a knee versus a liver versus a kidney. So how does it shift what kind of information to give? Because the exosomes in themselves, when you, let's say you inject them or you know, it, it's the same material to start with. So how does it change based on the environment that it ends up in?
[00:18:10] Speaker B: Yeah, so I guess a good analogy might be to look at a building.
Both most buildings are sort of the same. They require bricks and cabling and mortar. And so those are the raw materials. Those are the, the, the, the generics. And exosomes are able to provide those generic materials to cells. Now there are also exosomes that are derived from specific cells and specific tissue that have slightly different signals that can promote perhaps osteogenesis. Those would, those would be very, very specific. And they would have the general information plus the specific information to try to induce bone growth or cartilage growth or any other tissue specific growth. So when you're Talking about generic MSCs, they contain the generic information, the bricks, the motor, the wiring, so that cells can utilize that to fix Themselves, but they don't necessarily carry specific information, like here is how you make new cartilage. So that's why we like to use umbilical cord blood cells sometimes in clinical trials, because those living cells can respond to the environment and say, okay, you need to make this product. I know how to do that. And so it will make exosomes with that specific information and then deliver that to the, to the cells.
[00:19:25] Speaker C: So that, that would be then the benefit of using then amniotic because I mean, obviously a whole baby comes out of the amniotic. I mean, and that's every part, I mean there's no part that does not come out of it. So it contains, and the information for every, every piece, specific instruction throughout the whole body, depending on what you need.
[00:19:47] Speaker B: Yeah, so the research is still ongoing, of course, but that's why we like to use amniotic fluid, because it's like an orchestra. Those extracellular vesicles and those proteins that are soluble in the amniotic fluid are from the developing fetus, developing placenta and the mother. And all those signals together accumulate in the amniotic fluid. And that their sole job is, is to nourish the baby and to nourish the mother. It's actually a two way street. The mother's physiology changes quite substantially during pregnancy because of the amniotic fluid. And so all those signals function like an orchestra and give the body everything that it needs. All the signals, the immunomodulation, the tissue growth signals, versus a product perhaps from a culture expansion, where you have one cell type, one signal and one instruction manual.
[00:20:34] Speaker C: And you talked about the kind of immunomodulation, I mean, so an individual getting exosomes, obviously this is from another tissue, from someone else. So is there a risk for people like dealing with graft versus host disease or where we don't want to trigger an immune system response in any shape or form. Is there a risk for a person like that?
[00:21:03] Speaker B: Well, what's exciting about perinatal tissues is that they are designed by nature to avoid the immune system. They are what we call immune evasive. Now, a lot of people think that exosomes are immune privileged, which means that they are completely invisible to the immune system, which is not the case. They are immune evasive, they do not elicit a major immune response. But if you keep using the same exosome over and over again, what you can end up doing is potentially immunizing the patient against future administration. So you get a diminishing return on those kinds of products. Whereas with the amniotic fluid, you can't immunize. It's a new product. It's a new lot every single time. And so the body responds to it as if it's seeing it for the very first time. So unlike using adult tissues, if we transplant a heart from an adult to another adult, we need to worry about graft versus host, we need to worry about rejection. But perinatal tissues have this privileged state where they're able to avoid the immune system and they don't activate a rejection.
[00:22:07] Speaker C: And so when we get in the exosomes and just kind of want to have it really clear in my head, so we get the exosomes, let's say we have damaged tissue, wherever it is, it comes from amniotic. And. And so it will go there, then provide the raw material and also the instruction manuals to tell the other cells how to fix it. So if we have like diseased cells that are there, or maybe not disease, but the dysfunctional cells, then it will support the healing of those dysfunctional cells so that they become operative as if they were healthy.
[00:22:44] Speaker B: Yep, that's basically it. So I can give you another example. We recently submitted an IND to the FDA for a CL, a phase 1, phase 2 clinical trial to treat post Covid syndrome with amniotic fluid. And the way that we believe the mechanism of action works is that we modulate the cytokine storm that's associated with that, so we reduce tissue damage. And the way that works is those extracellular vesicles find the immune cells that are hyperactive, that are producing all this pro inflammatory cytokine. And what they do is they modulate the inflammation, they turn off those cells and say, hey, you're going out of control. Let's just temper this a little bit. And so they turn off the immune cells, which stops the feed forward loop. And so you get a reduction in inflammatory cytokines, which reduces the cytokine storm and then improves repair. So those exosomes, those extracellular vesicles, are able to communicate to the cells that are out of control, hey, this is not what you're supposed to be doing. Let's temper this a little bit, and then we can get back on track. We can maintain homeostasis instead of a state of disease.
[00:23:50] Speaker C: And what effect did you see?
[00:23:53] Speaker B: Yeah, so we haven't started the clinical trial yet. We're still waiting for final approval on the protocol. However, we have done a lot of preclinical work, and we see that these. The amniotic fluid is incredibly potent. At modulating inflammation. And we're able to drive down all those markers of pro inflammatory cytokines across a huge panel, in vitro and also in animal studies as well.
[00:24:16] Speaker C: Well, because I know. So let's say an individual, you know, from the COVID you have a lot of kind of respiratory concerns. So. And I know some people, I mean, myself included, we were actually nebulizing then amniotic exosomes and then impacting the respiratory that way. Is that the only way? Or would you just do like an IV infusion would be good enough or a subcutaneous would be good enough? I mean, what, what would be the best?
[00:24:47] Speaker B: So unfortunately, I can't give medical advice. I just want to make that.
[00:24:51] Speaker C: Yeah, your researchers, all of this is research. So.
[00:24:55] Speaker B: So one of the keys to how we believe amniotic fluid works in the case of lung distress or lung disease, including Covid, including copd, is that during the development of the fetus, the. It requires the ingestion of amniotic fluid in order for the gastrointestinal tract to develop, but also it respires amniotic fluid. Now we know that the fetus isn't breathing, but just the body movements of the fetus draws the amniotic fluid into the lungs. And we found that without amniotic fluid going into the lungs, the lungs also do not develop correctly. So there's a lot of pro growth factors in amniotic fluid that are required for fetal lung growth. And so our hypothesis was, well, if it's good enough for the fetus, then maybe it's good enough for diseased lungs in adults. And that seems to be the case. Not only does amniotic fluid cause an immunomodulation, so bringing down the inflammation that's causing most of the disease, but also it seems to be able to initiate repair in the lungs, just like it's inducing growth in the fetal lungs. So this is a gift from nature that we're able to take advantage of. And so we're very, very excited about the potential.
[00:26:10] Speaker C: So talking about immunomodulation and then kind of calming down that inflammatory response. So then we're looking at a couple of things. I mean, one, in regenerative medicine, you have this term inflammaging, that the inflammation is driving aging. And by controlling that inflammatory response, we are then able to reduce the aging process. And then also we have the, the arena with this autoimmune conditions that, that are just, you know, it's, it's, it's a pandemic. I mean, it's, it's just escalating in all different areas. So it sounds, and to me, like exosomes, when you're dealing with these kind of conditions, if you just want to use it for regeneration and to reduce the biological clock in, you know, by quenching the. The inflammating process, you know, that becomes a powerful tool, or if it's one step further, if you want to deal with a person dealing with a disease like autoimmune condition, then exosomes can be a viable tool.
[00:27:17] Speaker B: Yeah. You know, what's amazing is that they are so diverse in their ability to signal to tissues to repair and heal themselves. And we've donated product for emergency use many times. We've donated about $300,000 worth of products so far to NFL players who have had traumatic brain injuries or just concussions, I should say, to autoimmune disease patients. And most recently, we were featured on the news, or our product was featured on the news because we donated product to a firework victim. And I'll be happy to share those slides with you because they're available through the news network. And also we're about to publish this case study. We were able to influence the healing of her skin. She. She had been hit by a firework. The firework exploded on her leg. She received third degree burns. And the physicians thought because of her age, you know, being an adult, and in their experience, it typically takes two to three months for injuries like that to. To heal. And she was going to require extensive, extensive skin grafts. And so she was in incredible pain, 10 out of 10 in pain. She was on opioids, which of course, you know, is fueling a major pandemic right now. And so we wanted to get her off the opioids, and we wanted to help heal the leg. And so we donated product and it was sprayed on the leg. And what was miraculous is that we taught the skin of the leg to not heal like an adult, but to heal like a newborn. And so it healed like a newborn. So instead of two to three months requiring extensive skin grafts, it healed almost entirely in six days, and no skin grafts required. Within the hour, her pain level went down from 10 out of 10 to 2 out of 10. So she was immediately off of opioids, which is a major thing for us to see. And she's healing almost completely now. So that was featured on the news because the physicians just couldn't believe what they were seeing. And the reason it worked that well is because we taught the skin the Old skin to heal like it did when it was younger. Remember when you were able to heal like this, do it again. Here are the tools. Here's the instruction manual. We provided that. And the skin was able to heal itself like a baby.
[00:29:31] Speaker C: So, I mean, so for a person, then just kind of spray that on your face on a fairly consistent basis. I mean, that, that would. You would tell then your skin cells in your face, right, To. To heal like. Like a newborn. Right.
[00:29:46] Speaker B: Where we actually are in the process of developing a cosmetic brand called Lilium, and the idea there is that we're able to apply this product to the face and turn it back into baby soft skin again. Because the reason we get wrinkly, the reason we get gray, the reason. Reason we have pale skin is because we lose the vasculature and we lose the collagen. And these. The amniotic fluid is able to provide those signals again. And what we're seeing is remarkable results in our testing where we're able to revascularize and also add baby collagens again. So you get that baby. But soft skin on. On your cheeks. And it stays. It stays for a long period of time. Because you're teaching the fibroblasts. The fibroblasts are the cells in your skin that make the collagen. You're teaching them how to make the baby collagen. Baby collagen again. And not just the adult collagen, which is much less robust than the collagens that we lose the ability to make.
[00:30:46] Speaker C: So, I mean, so we have this in the skin, but obviously this takes place in our whole body. I mean, so we have degeneration and maybe we don't have a disease, but, you know, as we get older. Disease, yeah, the regeneration doesn't take place as well as it should. So in your mind, I mean, it sounds like if we then do like, exosome I be on a fairly regular basis, then we continually are supporting healthy instructions in our tissues. And it sounds like the exosomes drive to the area where it's the highest level of inflammation. So obviously where it's the highest level of inflammation, that's where most of the aging is taking place. So it's like it's fixing the biggest fire first. So. So what would be kind of a. A healthy protocol for an individual that. That just wants to ward off aging? I mean, we don't want to get dementia. We don't want to get Alzheimer's. We don't. We want to be able to run. We want to look Good. You know, all those minor little things we want to do if we're going to live to 100.
[00:31:51] Speaker B: Well, you know, babies are very healthy, and they are, as they grow, young individuals are able to run and jump and bend much easier than we do because they have all of the signals that the body requires in order to maintain homeostasis and to keep healthy skin, joints, tendons, ligaments, etc. We lose that ability because we age. So if you can supplement back those raw materials and those instruction manuals, then theoretically we can slow down or even reverse the symptoms of aging. And we're seeing that right now in animal experiments where we're able to give amniotic fluid infusions to these animals, and we're able to see markers of aging decreasing. And I think we're actually able to, when we dial in the right concentrations and the right doses, I think we'll actually be able to reverse the clock in these individuals as well. So very exciting data coming down the pike right now, and we hope to be able to translate that to humans very soon.
[00:32:59] Speaker C: Have you.
Do you have any kind of anecdotal stories of people that started to use and how do you administer it? Is it mostly just you spray it on the skin or do you. Intravenous or how's it being administered?
[00:33:15] Speaker B: Yeah. Well, what a lot of people don't realize is that amniotic fluid has been used in medicine for over a hundred years.
It's quite amazing that only now are we really starting to understand the full potential of amniotic fluid. But over those hundred years, amniotic fluid has been used in many different ways as eye drops for eyes. Because, of course, amniotic fluid is critical for the development of fetal eyes. And without amniotic fluid, the eyes don't develop correctly. So having eyedrops made out of amniotic fluid is incredibly potent. And physicians have been using these kinds of products for decades. But also they use them for infusions. They have been infusing them iv, they've been introducing them intramuscular, intraperitoneal, intranasal, all kinds of administration routes have been used by physicians all around the world for. For decades now. And the safety data is remarkable, Remarkable safety data and efficacy data. So we're hoping in the very near future that we're going to be able to get some of these products approved by the FDA to make them readily available to everybody that deserves them, because the data demonstrating safety is. The data demonstrating efficacy is there. We just need to somehow move that down the road. With the fda, because this is the future of medicine. We're teaching the body how to heal itself using natural products the body makes itself in order to make a brand new human.
[00:34:45] Speaker C: Yeah, yeah, I. So, so if you would do it intravenously, I mean, I.
How would you feel different? I mean, do you just feel better? Do you feel. I mean, what, what are some. Some changes for kind of a general person that, let's say they're not dealing with a disease per se. Yeah. But they just want to. They just want to battle aging. I mean, what are some of the stories that you hear that people experience when they introduce it intravenously, per se?
[00:35:16] Speaker B: One of the things that I hear from physicians is that there's almost an immediate response when it comes to things like brain fog. So brain fog is essentially inflammation. And when you receive amniotic fluid, either IV or intranasal, the. The amniotic fluid and the EVs are able to make it to the brain because first of all, they can pass the blood brain barrier because they are small enough and immuno evasive, so they're able to get through the guard. The guard house. That's the blood brain barrier, and they're able to reduce that inflammation almost immediately. So within days, people who have chronic brain fog are seeing full recovery.
We're hearing stories of stroke patients, and we're seeing video of stroke patients who are immobilized, able to reduce the inflammation in their brain and get sensation and movement back again. So anywhere where there's inflammation, just even obesity, surprisingly enough, obesity is essentially a chronic inflammation, a state of chronic inflammation. So if you're a heavy drinker, if you don't eat well, you eat a lot of sugars, this causes inflammation. And IV infusions of amniotic fluid have been demonstrated to reduce systemic inflammation. That's why we're excited about our clinical trial for post Covid syndrome, that we're able to reduce the systemic inflammation in the body. So reducing systemic inflammation, reducing local inflammation, these are the sort of targets for these perinatal tissues.
[00:36:50] Speaker C: And so going down into all the autoimmune conditions, you know, people with lupus, auto ra, Crohn's disease, colitis. I mean, yeah.
[00:36:58] Speaker B: And Lyme, you know, Lyme's a big one right now with. It's an immune dysregulation. And so we're very excited to start some trials in, in 2023 looking at Lyme, because, you know, I have a master's degree in parasitology as well, because I was interested how parasites interact with the immune system. And it turns out that parasites use exosomes to modulate inflammation to avoid captured by the immune system. And so that sort of evolved into regenerative medicine for me. But Lyme is a, is a parasite, but Lyme syndrome is really an issue with the immune system. We have a dysregulation of the immune system which allows the symptoms of Lyme to come to a head. And so we think that amniotic fluid infusions in the future are going to be very effective against those symptoms.
[00:37:47] Speaker C: So where would you use that in the process of treatment for Lyme? Would you use it kind of right from the get go or. Because commonly now, I mean, you start with antibiotic treatments and if, if you do antibiotic, but then some you have that use different herbals, you know, like Japanese knotweed or cat's claw or you know, things like that. So where in the process of treatment would you use exosomes? Would you use it from the get go or kind of the, the post Lyme where you kind of kill the pathogens but the immune system is still dysregulated and you need to kind of modulated at that time?
[00:38:25] Speaker B: Yeah, well, we're still in the process of figuring out the protocols that we'll be using, hopefully next year. But from my perspective, I would imagine you would use it throughout the duration of the treatment because everything, you know, can work synergistically with those tried and tested treatments. But from my perspective, I don't believe that the parasite itself or the borrelia is necessarily the thing that we need to be focused on when treating Lyme. Yes, we identify it as being present, but why is it now symptomatic when it could be laying dormant for four decades? It's because of the immune dysregulation. So we can fix the immune dysregulation. Just like toxic toxoplasmosis, it sits dormant in the brain when you have a normal immune system. But when you are dysregulated or when you're immunocompromised, like with HIV or something, they become activated because they're not repressed by the immune system anymore. So if you can fix the immune system, I think you can fix a lot of the other issues associated with Lyme. And we don't necessarily have to focus on the, the, the pathogen itself. We need to think more about why we're not able to control the pathogen anymore.
[00:39:40] Speaker C: Yeah, and, and that is exactly what you're saying. I mean, we all have parasites we all, I would say the majority of us have some borrelia inside of us or Bartonella or Babesia and all of these things. The only reason we don't get tested.
[00:39:54] Speaker B: Is because we don't have symptoms.
[00:39:55] Speaker C: Yeah.
[00:39:55] Speaker B: So, you know, then you go, you, you start having symptoms, so you go get tested, you say, oh, I have borrelia. I, I must have been bitten by a tick. When you've, you, you've probably had it for, for decades and you probably got it from a mosquito because, you know, mosquitoes, spiders, ticks, they all carry, you know, potentially carry these, these parasites, but only when we are immunocompromised. And, you know, it's really interesting, but if you look at the statistics, it's mostly premenopausal women that experience Lyme, which is a big indicator for me that this is not anything to do with a tick bite, but it's more to do with a global, a pandemic of infection that is controlled by the immune system. And when we undergo changes to our immune system, like menopause, do we see this get out of control? And of course, it's not just premenopausal women. There's a lot of different people, but if you look at the statistics, there's a Gaussian distribution and it's mostly premenopausal women with, you know, other people who have immune disorders as well, like people who over drink, people who eat too much sugar. You know, all these people are immunocompromised and then at some point there's a trigger and you get activation of the syndrome.
[00:41:04] Speaker C: It's kind of like with the COVID scenario that the people that we impacted the most are the ones that, you know, dealt with with comorbidities, you know, like obesity or cardiac or diabetes or things like that.
[00:41:17] Speaker B: And people aren't really talking about the reasons. If we just think about obese people for a second, why are obese people at risk? You know, there's a lot of chatter about obese people being at risk, but why are they at risk? For two reasons. One, they are chronically inflamed. So if you're going to have a virus that's going to activate a cytokine storm, you're already, the plate's already hot, that you've got a furnace burning already and now you're going to put gasoline on it with the virus. That's one of the reasons why obese people are at risk, because they are already chronically inflamed. The second reason they're High at risk is because Covid is a vascular disease. We think of it as a lung disease. We think it's like flu, but it is not. It is a vascular disease. So it affects the vasculature in your brain, in your heart, in your lungs, throughout your body. You get peripheral neuropathy because it kills the nerves and the vascular capillaries in your extremities. It's a vascular disease. And what do obese people have? More vasculature than anybody else. Because all that adipose is vascularized, heavily vascularized. So it's more room for the virus to live. There's more vessels, there's more capillaries. So you have a greater viral load, which then causes more inflammation. So for those two reasons, that's why obese people are more at risk than a healthy, svelte individual.
[00:42:41] Speaker C: Fascinating. Fascinating. And then going into stem, we talk a lot about the exosomes because it's fascinating to me. And obviously, you know, you've done 20 plus years of this, so you have a lot to say. You have a lot of information going into stem cells. So sorry, it's not stem cells, regenerative cells, or.
[00:43:05] Speaker B: Yeah, we. We can call it cellular therapy or cytotherapy or regenerative medicine.
I've been encouraging people to try to get away from the use of the term stem cells because we trying to help the FDA navigate how to regulate this space. So the way we start by regulating the space correctly is by using the correct terminology. So I was featured in Top Doctor magazine a little while ago with my article where, if anybody's interested, they can read that. Where I explain why it's important to use the correct terminology and what the correct terminology is.
[00:43:39] Speaker C: So tell me, cellular therapy, is that the correct or which one? Because I would.
[00:43:44] Speaker B: Again, this is where we're getting specific. So cellular therapy would require the presence of live healthy cells. Amniotic fluid is acellular. It doesn't contain cells. So that would be regenerative therapy or regenerative medicine. It's not cytotherapy, it's not cell therapy, certainly not stem cell therapy, because it doesn't contain any cells at all, let alone stem cells.
[00:44:09] Speaker C: Because using them, cellular therapy would be considered regenerative medicine as well. Correct?
[00:44:15] Speaker B: Yeah, it's all regenerative medicine. But within regenerative medicine, you have acellular and you have cellular products and you also have matrix products. So, for example, Wharton's jelly or amnion patches. These are matrix products. Then you have amniotic fluid, which is a liquid Tissue. So it's a tissue just like blood and semen, but it's a liquid tissue. And then you have cellular products like you have Wharton's jelly cellular products where you have matrix plus cells. And you also have umbilical cord blood, which is of course plasma cord blood, plasma plus all the white blood cells that you would find in the cord blood. So cellular and acellular regenerating products.
[00:44:57] Speaker C: And so because you use an exosomes from the amniotic fluid. So what is the difference in functionality between using the exosomes from that from the amniotic versus using the amniotic itself?
[00:45:14] Speaker B: Well, first of all, the amniotic fluid contains a lot of different EVs, a lot of different extracellular vesicles. In order to be called an exosome, the EV has to have a very specific surface repertoire. It has to have certain receptors on its surface and it has to have a certain biochemistry. And so we don't look at the surface markers of the EVs. So it's a, it's an orchestra of different types of, of EVs that are present. But also there are soluble growth factors, over 300 bioactive growth factors in amniotic fluid that contribute to the, to the effect. So. Sorry, I lost track of the question.
[00:45:53] Speaker C: That's okay.
[00:45:55] Speaker B: What's the difference between the EVs and the cellular products?
[00:45:58] Speaker C: Yeah, well, the difference between, because you have the amniotic flu, you have products out there where you, you use the amniotic fluid and, and you can inject that in joints and you'd use that as a therapy versus and the exosomes like you do, that you extract from the amniotic fluid. Is, is there benefit?
[00:46:16] Speaker B: Right.
Amniotic fluid versus purified amniotic fluid. So purified amniotic fluid is completely clear. It's a golden color, but you can see straight through it. It's completely clear. Raw amniotic fluid is cloudy. And the reason it's cloudy is because it has a lot of non regenerative material in there. So Vernix apoptotic bodies. When the cells die, they, they bleb, they make these apoptotic bodies which are large extracellular vesicles that contain no regenerative signals. And we don't want those because they're potentially immunogenic. They could potentially elicit an immune response. So when a woman is giving birth and she ruptures and bleeds and amniotic fluid mixes with her blood, it can be very dangerous because of all of the raw materials in the amniotic fluid. So we are very, very careful. I've been working with these tissues for many, many years. And so we're able to extract all those bad products and just be left with the purified amniotic fluid, which again, has been used safely in medicine for over 100 years. And so if, if a physician is running a clinical trial and doesn't know which amniotic fluid to use, they must look at the vials themselves. If it's cloudy, that means it's potentially dangerous because the junk hasn't been removed. And of course that means that it hasn't been sterile filtered either, because if it's still cloudy, it hasn't been, it can't go through the filter. And so what typically a facility might do is irradiate it. And if you irradiate it, you kill all the rna, you damage all the proteins. So essentially you're turning this into a mess. Versus the purified amniotic fluid, which is sterile filtered. Everything is still alive. The EVs are intact, the proteins are intact, the RNA is intact, and they're able to contribute positively to regeneration instead of having any kind of medical risk.
[00:48:10] Speaker C: And thank you so much. And then we go into then the cellular therapy. So how does.
I'm still trying to get over not calling them stem cells. The cellular therapy that we then introduce, how do they differ than the exosomes? The exosomes do the signaling, provide the raw material, modulate the inflammatory responses, and then we bring in then the cellular therapy. And what does it do? I mean, because you have what. Yeah, what does it do to regenerate?
[00:48:48] Speaker B: Let's use another analogy. Let's say that you are a cell and you're an expert in fixing, fixing damage. And you want to communicate that to Joe over here, who is not an expert or who is perhaps getting a little bit old. So you write him a letter, right? You write him a letter. That's an exit zone. So you as a healthy individual with smart knowledge about how to fix yourself, you write all that information down and you give it to Joe. Now Joe has all that information. So that's how cellular therapy works. You put the experts in the area, they look around and they say they're able to sense the environment because they have receptors on their surface and they're getting all those signals from the environment. They say, okay, we've got inflammation, we've got damage, we've got high reactive oxygen species. What is it that we can do? And so it writes out a prescription or writes down the Instructions, packages it in an exosome and shoots it out to its neighbors, which then sticks to the neighbor. It opens up, it delivers the cargo. Joe is able to read the letter and say, okay, now I know what. What I have to do. So the difference between cells and exosomes is that cells are the experts that can respond to the environment. They're cognizant, almost, you could say. And then the note is the exosome, it doesn't know what it's doing. It just contains the information that it got from the expert and is now the way that it's. The information is delivered to the recipient.
[00:50:11] Speaker C: So the cells, they deliver, I mean, they contain the exosomes that deliver to the environment. But then also, I heard in regards to the mitochondrial regeneration, that helps in that arena as well, Correct?
[00:50:27] Speaker B: Yeah. So, of course, we don't have the time to go into the full repertoire of what all the cells do in regenerative medicine, because it's vast, that it's very exciting.
[00:50:35] Speaker C: That's what I'm saying. 20 years, you know.
[00:50:38] Speaker B: Exactly. And a whole PhD. But I love that you brought that up, because that's a very, very exciting observation that was made relatively recently, that MSCs have the ability, when they find a senescent or sick cell, is to come and park next to them and form a bridge between them and a microtubule, and they're able to donate mitochondria across those tubules into the sick cell, which is like donating a battery pack. So you take a battery pack from the healthy cell and you donate it through these little tunnels into the sick cell. That allows them to get the energy they need to be able to repair themselves. So we are actually able to see when we. When we mark these mitochondria with a dye or a radio label, we can see them being shuttled between the cells, making these cells healthy again. It's quite remarkable. And again, it's all about the orchestra. So it's not just one cell doing one thing. It's multiple cells doing multiple things, because we're very complex. The human body is very, very complex, and it needs all these different signals happening at the same time. And so we need mscs, we need endothelial cells, we need epithelial cells. We need all these different cells within our body working in concert together to regenerate the tissue. It's not just one cell, and it's not just one exosome.
[00:51:58] Speaker C: And with the senescent cells, I mean, they themselves, another term that people call them, are like zombie Cells, you know, that just kind of hanging out there, they're not dying. Yeah. So but they're, they're triggering an inflammation, causing inflammation. So by then giving them mitochondria or healthy mitochondria, you're turning off their senescence so they, they stop being your revert than a zombie into a healthy individual. And now it's not walking around killing other people or making other zombies or creating inflammation in the body. So you're, you're kind of hitting it twice. So to say you're stopping the inflammation is doing. And it's craving a healthy cells.
[00:52:41] Speaker B: Yeah, you got it. Actually, a lot of people think the zombie cells, these senescent cells, are essentially just cells that have stopped doing what they were doing and now just hanging out. But you're absolutely right. What we believe is that the senescent cells are what the body uses to age itself. And let me explain that just a little bit. So the body actively ages. It's an evolutionary conserved mechanism to remove old individuals from the population to free up resources for the next generation. So we haven't, we have an off switch. Aging isn't just something that has to happen, because as we know, there are many species that disconnect chronological aging from biological aging. And there are species that just don't age. You know, look at lobsters. Lobsters do not age. They continue to grow throughout their entire life. And the only way they die is either we eat them, they die from disease, or they literally crush themselves under their own weight when they're trying to shed their exoskeleton because they've gotten so big. So there are species out there that don't age. It's not inevitable. And, but what these zombie cells do, what these senescent cells do, is reinforce within the body that is time to age. It is time to die. And they, they help instruct all the other cells, just like zombies. It's a great analogy to become senescent and start turning off, start turning yourself off, because we need to age, and that's the active process. So when you then flood the system with perinatal tissues like amniotic fluid, the body is confused. Or wait a minute, now we're receiving signals like we're a newborn. Okay, you stop doing the zombie stuff and start focusing on growing tissue and repairing tissue, because I'm getting the signals that we are a newborn. That's what it comes down to. That's all it comes down to, is teaching the body what it should be doing. If you want to be young, like A young individual, you have to have young signals. If you don't have young signals, then you have old signals that will progressively move you towards older age and eventually.
[00:54:37] Speaker C: Death as it's such fascinating. Well, Dr. White, I mean you. Yeah, you can talk about this forever and I know people go to, to your company's website and Neobiosis. There's a tremendous amount of information there where people can learn more. Thank you so much for, for sharing your expertise and for everything you're doing to make sure that we can live long. Live long and live healthy long. Yeah, that's what we want to do. So thank you so much.
[00:55:06] Speaker B: In the health span, that's we're not necessarily interested in making people live longer. We're interested in making people live better towards the, towards the end of their lifetime, which consequently, consequently might mean they live longer. But that's our goal, healthy living. And I would encourage anybody listening to this, if they're interested in the field of regenerative medicine, to go to the American College of Regenerative Medicine. It's a platform where everybody, patient advocates, patients, doctors and scientists can come together to talk about how we can move this field in a, in a positive way forward.
[00:55:41] Speaker C: I love it. Thank you so much. Wonderful.
[00:55:44] Speaker B: Thanks for having me.
[00:55:45] Speaker C: Foreign.
[00:55:53] Speaker A: This podcast is for educational purposes only and is not designed to diagnose or treat any disease. I hope this podcast impacted you as it did me. Please subscribe so that you can be notified when new episodes are released. There are some excellent shows coming up that you do not want to miss. If you enjoy these podcasts, please take a moment to write a review. And please don't keep this information to yourself. Share them with your family and friends. You never know what piece of information that will transform their lives. For past episodes and powerful information on how to conquer lyme, go to integrativelimesolutions.com and an additional powerful resource, limestream.com for lime support and group discussions. Joint Lyme Conquerors Mentoring Lyme warriors on Facebook if you'd like to know more about the cutting edge integrative Lyme therapies my center offers, please visit thecarlfeltcenter.com thank you for spending this time with us and I hope to see you at our next episode of Integrative lyme Solutions with Dr. Karl Feld.
[00:57:02] Speaker C: Ra.
