One Element of Health and Wellness that you Should Know About but Don’t: Stem Cells

by Neal Rouzier, MD

I now want to take this opportunity to introduce to you why I feel that the 7th Academic Summit: Breakthroughs in Brain Health, CVD, and Autoimmunity will be the most important and enlightening conference that you will attend. Although I have introduced my topics during the last several newsletters, I want to introduce to you one of the most important topics and lectures that pertains to our goal of optimizing health and wellness. Oddly, it is a subject that most of us know nothing about and that I had never heard of personally in all my reading and research. Even physicians in the field of hematology/immunology are not familiar with the concepts as there is no venue for us/them to attend in order to learn anything about it (except through WLM). It truly fits into the category of anti-aging or disease prevention. I stumbled upon it by accident. A WLM attendee, Todd House, told me that I needed to go see this guy in Florida. I inquired as to why I needed to do this, and Todd just simply told me that if I wanted to get fixed and healed, then I needed to go see him. When I further pressed Todd to explain what, why, and how, Todd simply said that it was too complex to explain but that I needed to just do it. Todd explained that if I wanted to learn why my stem cells, exosomes, PRP, and all other treatment modalities weren’t working for me, then I really needed to go see Dr. Maharaj in Florida. However, I first need to tell you about me and what wasn’t working.

Ten years ago, I was still skiing the steep and deep, running stair climb races, and playing competitive sports to the fullest. Then disaster struck after a bilateral fluoroquinolone-induced quadricep tendon rupture with subsequent MRSA joint sepsis and ascending necro fasciitis. Multiple reconstructions and joint sepsis left me with a crippled leg and chronic fatigue with recurrent joint space infections. After several back surgeries, chronic myositis, and subsequent neuropathy, I have deteriorated even further and become frail in comparison with yesteryear. I just wrote it off to bad luck. It certainly was not hormonal as I am the MOST hormonally and supplement optimized patient possible. I searched high and low for a cause/cure for the deterioration and could find none. However, by a stroke of serendipitous good luck (amidst all the bad) Todd House introduced me to Dr. Maharaj in Boynton Beach, Florida, who is a hematologist/stem cell transplant specialist. This opened up a whole new world that I was not familiar with and that very much pertained to me. How did I not know or hear about this? So, off I went to Boynton Beach, Florida, to meet with Dr. Maharaj.

Was there finally an answer to all the pain, inflammation, chronic infections, chronic debilitating myositis, arthritis, disability, fatigue, loss of strength and endurance, frailty, neuropathy and muscle atrophy? Dr. Maharaj says yes. Dr. Maharaj is the opposite of me (the stereotypical ER doc). He is kind, sympathetic, empathetic, patient, considerate, compassionate, and methodical in explaining my autoimmune pathology, the reason for the intractable inflammation, and abnormal T-cells, B-cells, and natural killer cells seen on my lab tests (also something that I had never seen before). Upon reviewing my lab results, he kept nodding his head noting that there was an explanation for each one of my ailments. He confided that I had every right to feel like crap as he demonstrated the lab results showed some defect in my T-cells, B-cells, and natural killer cells as well as their functionality. This was all new and unexplored territory for me. Every sign and symptom I had was countered by, “I could have told you that by looking at your lab result.” I knew that I felt rotten, but I had no clue as to why or what to do about it. For Dr. Maharaj it was so simple as he stated that all my signs and symptoms were predicted by my very poor lab results. For every lab abnormality, there was a symptom or problem that could be attributed to it. For every complaint and problem that I related, he said that it could be explained by a cellular abnormality. Dr. Maharaj then went on to explain that he can provide a therapy to improve the multiple deficits in my immune system, where the numbers should be, and how to correct them back to normal. It was truly an eye-opener, and one that gave me great hope as I envisioned that I would have to live like this and just deal with the rapidly progressive deterioration and frailty. Fortunately, I have started the treatments and am on my way to “optimizing” my immune system, decreasing the uncontrolled inflammation, and cleaning up the senescent stem cells that were no longer working/functioning optimally. Ultimately, that process depends on NKC numbers and function which removes senescent stem cells thereby allowing normal functioning stem cells to restore normal function of all tissues. Embarrassingly, my NKC count was zero.  Yep, zero. And functionality? Yep, also zero. No wonder I felt the way I felt and continued to deteriorate.

For years I had tried stem cells, exosomes, plasma extracts, super-PRP, etc., all to no avail. Why weren’t my stem cell injections working? Because mine were senescent and non-functioning. Why were my stromal stem cells senescent and not young and healthy? Because the marrow and stomal stem cells were senescent resulting in uncontrolled inflammation, a concept that was quite foreign to me. I was also not aware that inflammation was not allowing the various cell therapies to work, thus my lack of benefit to the many treatments I had utilized. As Dr. Maharaj explains, in a younger patient the treatments would have worked well, but not in me. Rather, the old senescent cells were not being replaced/removed by natural killer cells and that resulted in significant inflammation. My natural killer cell count was zero. My NKC activity was zero and that was the cause of inflammation and inability to heal normally. How could I be alive with NKC function so low? Dr. Maharaj wondered the same thing. The significant inflammation that I had was killing the stem cell treatments that I had received which was why I perceived no benefit after all the times that I had stromal stem cells, exosomes, PRP, etc. injected into many different areas. But that inflammation also affects my own stem cell function, and I knew of no remedy to reverse this. The uncontrolled inflammation prevented any benefit from any therapy but also severely affected my own stem cell/immune system. The complete loss of functional NKCs resulted in my innate immune system to falter, not heal, and to continue to deteriorate. What was I to do? 

The inflammation and inability of the body to correct itself leads to the deterioration seen with aging and frailty. The good news is that it can be diagnosed by extensive lab tests, and it can be treated with cutting age medicines to restore the bone marrow’s functionality. The various abnormal cell counts, and their function, can be restored by various cell and marrow stimulating medications. The aches and pains and senile changes in the musculoskeletal system can be corrected and reversed. More so, the abnormal changes that lead to cancer, CVD, DM, neurodegenerative disease (AD), and infections can also be reversed. I will let Dr. Maharaj explain and detail the rest. His pleasant, sweet demeanor allows him to explain to us with great detail and eloquence so that all practitioners can understand the concepts and benefits of his therapies. Correcting these immune cell abnormalities can provide such benefits for so many different patients with such complex problems and illnesses. Dr. Maharaj really enjoys teaching and sharing his success stories as he is one that appreciates how much fun it can be to make patients better when no other doctor can. Sounds familiar, like BHRT? BHRT is just one piece of the pie and I’m learning that there is so much more to the pie. 

Stay tuned. Neal