Interview with Dr. Alain Moreau, creator of Scoliosis blood test

[rohrer01]

I wonder if that's why I get restless leg when I take melatonin? It rarely, if ever, puts me to sleep. I don't respond to drugs in a predictable way, either. It's very frustrating for both me and my doctor.

[Dingo]

bacteria

I think it's fascinating that exposure to harmful bacteria could potentially drive curve progression in genetically susceptible children.

Interestingly enough scientists are developing a urine test to detect Autism in children. It measures the by-products of gut bacteria.
Autism Finding Could Lead to Simple Urine Test for the Condition

The researchers suggest that their new understanding of the makeup of bacteria in autistic children's guts could also help scientists to develop treatments to tackle autistic people's gastrointestinal problems.

Evidently children with Autism have a different balance of bacteria compared to non-autistic children. They aren't sure if this is a cause or consequence of Autism.

This made me wonder if children with Autism had a greater incidence of Scoliosis or perhaps more severe curves.

I did a google search of autism and scoliosis and I see that a lot of people are writing about it. But I don't know if research has been conducted to determine if the two are associated with each other.

[Dingo]

Smoking increases production of OPN

If there are any smokers out there who have children with Scoliosis they may want to read this.

Smoking increases the production of osteopontin in the lungs

They found high levels of osteopontin expression in patients with interstitial lung disease, whereas healthy smokers had lower levels, and healthy non-smokers produced no osteopontin. Osteopontin expression could be stimulated directly by nicotine treatment.

[rohrer01]

I would be very surprised if there were a link between scoliosis and autism. It does make sense that ANY time the metabolism is affected by a disorder, that you would find differences in gut bacteria type and/or quantity. Do you know if there have been any studies correlating scoliosis with higher levels of gut bacteria or the proliferation of different kinds of bacteria? I apologize in advance if I missed this in your interview posting. I'd bet you would find a difference in gut bacteria when comparing obese and thin people, too, due to slower/faster metabolisms. That's just my hypothesis.

[rohrer01]

If there are any smokers out there who have children with Scoliosis they may want to read this.

Smoking increases the production of osteopontin in the lungs

I would be careful here. They did not say what delivery method of nicotine treatment was used. This article also focused on the deliterious effects of osteopontin accumulation in the lungs. It said nothing about scoliosis.

[Dingo]

have to wait for the blood test

Rohrer01

Do you know if there have been any studies correlating scoliosis with higher levels of gut bacteria or the proliferation of different kinds of bacteria?

I don't think research has been done on that. We'll have to wait for the blood test and then quite a few years of testing before we know.

Scientists will have to sift through all of the potential environmental factors that can lead to a surge of OPN and figure out which one's matter to kids with a genetic susceptability to Scoliosis.

Dr. Moreau mentioned bacterial infections as a trigger. Interestingly OPN surges after surgical procedures because it's part of the healing process.

It is worth mentioning that bipedal surgeries (amputation of forelimbs) performed on C57Bl6 mice, which are naturally deficient in melatonin synthesis, induce scoliosis through an acute condition (the surgery) resulting in an elevation of OPN levels (since wound healing is a naturally inflammatory process), which cannot be decreased in absence of melatonin because melatonin is a powerful OPN inhibitor.

Right there you'd think that children with Scoliosis should take Melatonin. But unfortunately it won't work because the nervous system is dysfunctional and Melatonin can't get it's job done.

[Dingo]

obesity and Osteopontin

Obesity appears to increase the level of OPN in fat tissue.

Plasma osteopontin levels and expression in adipose tissue are increased in obesity

CONCLUSIONS: These findings represent the first observation that plasma OPN and mRNA expression of OPN in omental adipose tissue are increased in overweight/obese patients with the latter being further elevated in obesity-associated diabetes. Moreover, weight loss reduces OPN concentrations, which may contribute to the beneficial effects accompanying weight reduction. Measurement of OPN might be useful for evaluating the outcomes of various clinical interventions for obesity-related cardiovascular diseases.

[rohrer01]

Rohrer01

Right there you'd think that children with Scoliosis should take Melatonin. But unfortunately it won't work because the nervous system is dysfunctional and Melatonin can't get it's job done.

Adults, too. Like I said, melatonin wires me.

[flerc]

Hi Dingo, probably I'm not interpreting right, but I think that answer to question 15) implies that the only cause to progression in adults is a high level of OPN. That is say, if would be possible that someone of 20 years old and 5 º or 0º, develop a high level of OPN, she could reach 70º at 50 years old. Gravity force has nothing to do with progression?, someone with 80º and normal level of opn are free of progression?.
I think that progression should to be caused by some kind of problem with joints, ligaments, vertebras, discs, muscles, tendons, internal organs, fascias...
Do you know which of all of this is affecting OPN?

Regards

[Dingo]

curve progression

Flerc

Dr. Moreau's work shows that OPN drives curve progression. When OPN is blocked Scoliosis doesn't occur in mice. I'm not sure if this rules out all other causes of curve progression.

However even if other factors play a part it's important to keep in mind that OPN is reduced after succesful bracing or fusion. So it's not only part of the problem but it provides feedback as well.

So for instance let's say eating avacados drove curve progression. Eating an avacado might not directly increase OPN but it would make a curve grow worse. As the curve got worse OPN would likely rise in response.

Think of it this way. OPN is not only an engine but it's also a speedometer. I believe this is because it performs multiple jobs inside the body. For instance it's involved in bone remodeling, the immune system, inflammation, etc.

[PNUTTRO]

It doesn't change anything.

The test has great sensitivity and but little specificity.

There is nothing about this test that would make me feel better after having it done.

The dot plot on page 607 (figure 3) [Spine. 2010 Jun 1;35(13):E601-8] shows that most controls and patients fall into the range of 85-150. These are means of 3 independent tests for each individual. They state that the variation was "typically less than 10%. So a person with a score of 100 (is actually representative of a range from 95-105). If you get a score of 100-120, this test tell you nothing about if you are a patient or a control. More than 50% of the whole population is in this range.

Sorry, I wouldn't think my kid is out of the woods based on this test. It has zero predictive value in my mind.

Even if I got a score of 30, then it still means that I am going to do all the same stuff that I was planning to do anyway. Watch and wait. It doesn't change anything. If you got a score over 200, do you have enough confidence in the test to just do nothing, or are you going to watch for the scoliosis anyway?

Same thing with the genetic test. The doctors are not changing their treatment plans based on a Scolioscore. Parents are [NOT] going to change their observations of their kids.

[flerc]

Dingo, does it occurs in adult mice too? It’s unknown which is the exact effect it produces?
I think it should be so difficult it can affect all the suspected as guilty factors for the progression in an adult in the same way. If you are not sure, could you ask it to Dr. Moreau?

Thanks for all!

[rohrer01]

I think I would have a hard time believing that OPN drives curve progression. I would be more willing to believe that OPN rises as a response to curve progression. The reason I say this is because I had a "stable" curve for 20+ years. I have documented evidence that my curve progression occurred in conjunction with chiropractic treatment. OPN certainly was not the driving force here. In my case, anyway, adhesions holding the curve in place were probably broken as well as stretching of the ligaments during the adjustments. This resulted in weakening of the spine. Would I expect my OPN levels to rise, probably, especially if OPN is released due to an inflamatory response. BUT, maybe things work differently in children/adolescents with IS.

[flerc]

May be it is not the only one primary cause, but the most frequently primary/original cause. Sastre (Fed Machine) explains that scoliosis appears in rabbits when cartilagues suffer a traumation. And then, the curve begins to be reduced during growth with the Fed machine (adapted to rabbits). In this case Opn was not the primary cause, but may be the traumatism lead to an increase of Opn and curve increases and then decrease with Fed… who knows?
But if it exists some way to reduce Opn (as seems to be applied in mice) different to reducing another cause, and progression stops, then it should to be one cause and not only an indicator.
Dingo, do you know how was Opn reduced in mice?

[rohrer01]

Flerc,
If OPN is produced as a response to inflamation and then, once present, acts to drive progression, one would think that prolotherapy, as mentioned in your other thread, would be unsuccessful if not outright dangerous in the scoliotic patient. The whole purpose of the prolotherapy is to induce inflamation as a means to promote healing. Just a thought.