Low Dose Naltrexone: Interview with Linda Elsegood

welcome back to another episode of christian natural health today i'm very excited to have linda ellswood with us

linda is the founder of the uk charity ldn research trust established in 2004.

she has multiple sclerosis and low-dose naltrexone ldn significantly impacted her life she wanted to help other people

not only with ms but also all autoimmune diseases cancers mental health issues etc in the last 18 years the charity has

helped over a million people worldwide welcome linda thank you so much for being with us thank you very much it's a

pleasure to be here with you today yeah good for you for taking what you learned and turning it around to see what you

could do to you know spread the knowledge and help other people that's absolutely fantastic i love that thank

you so can you tell us a little bit about how ldn from from the research that you've done and you've written bunches

of books now what is it three you've got another one that's about to come out soon yes yeah so uh tell us a little bit

about lotus naltrexone how does it work pharmacologically and what is it that makes it kind of so useful across a

broad spectrum of possible things possible okay well briefly

it interrupts the homeostasis in the brain the brain's a reward system which

makes your body produce more endorphins which is your body's own natural painkiller and feel good factor

it also works on your toll-like receptors which um dr rachel allen and did a

presentation and she said it really well and i can't forget her presentation

it was like an army of soldiers with guns you know your toll light receptors target inflammation

um to reduce the inflammation and so many people

with autoimmune diseases have high levels of inflammation and by reducing

the inflammation they're a lot better so ldn works on that as well so

it's a non-toxic drug um it's it was trial back in the

1970s and it was only found harmful in doses

of 300 milligrams a day for addiction yeah so

for addiction it used um 150 milligrams a day they usually have

50 milligram tablets uh three times a day okay so you can see that is only half of the harmful dose

and we're talking you know maybe half a milligram up to 4.5 it can go either

side of that but that is the general window so it's a very very low dose

right um people the only thing that you have to be

really really careful with that is if you are on opioid medications especially

slow release opioids you can go into opioid withdrawal

which one lady actually did she went to the doctors and private doctor didn't disclose that she

was on any opioid pain medication she was asked and she said no i

don't take any painkillers and she was on um morphine and fentanyl patches

and she ended up in icu because she had terrible um withdrawal so it's always

some people think that you don't always need a doctor to

help you which is a really big mistake to

wean yourself off of opioids which i mean should only be done under supervision and certainly not putting

ldn in the mix all right if you're still on opioids that's a really big red flag

and i would hate to see anybody have to go through that sure yeah absolutely well one of the things that i love about

ldn is because unlike traditional pharmaceuticals where you're suppressing something this one it's almost

homeopathic in the way that it works where you're giving the body you're you have the primary effect which

is the blockade of those endorphin receptors but then the secondary effect of over production is what you're actually after and that's

what ends up kind of having that longer term effect so i think that's that's one of the reasons why i don't really shy

away from this one nearly as much as i do with using other types of pharmaceuticals that's really cool but people will say

so how long do i have to take mda you take it for as long as you want it

to work yeah and they said what about the accumulative effect well it's only in

the body for four hours so every day you're getting a 20 hour break you know it and you can just stop taking

it if you want to uh if you're going to have surgery if you take it stop taking it a couple of

days before you know it's completely out of your system and you should be fine

but there are some really really good videos on our website which explains how

ldm works what it does um they're all there for people to go and

have a look and dig deeper do their own research is always a good idea sure absolutely well

and in my clinical experience one of the ways that i've sometimes used it now certainly with autoimmunity you do kind

of have to continue it from what i've seen in order to continue to have the benefits from it

unless you can find and remove the underlying issue and then possibly you can take people off but sometimes from

like a neverwell sense kind of a scenario i will like never well since for example long covid i often will use

ldn as a reset button for that and sometimes people only need it for a very brief window and then they can get off

and kind of go about their business is that something that's in the literature at all or is that just something i've done

yes yes yeah and and coving is a really big hot topic obviously right now and in

the new book that's coming out there are actually two chapters and one specifically on long covered and the

other one is about um fiery damaged tissues which explains about um hovid

really really interesting i mean anybody who's wanting to prevent covid or treat kobe

while you've got it and then the long covered and you are so right there are so many people that are taking ldn

and sometimes once they're they're fine they can stop taking it when they've got a long covered

but it makes me smile because healthy people who haven't been around

sick people who have had cfs any even ms i mean i had chronic fatigue

fibromyalgia chronic fatigue so many healthy people who have got long

covered think that they're the first group of people that have had chronic

fatigue who haven't been aware yes exactly who haven't been aware that it's been around

but forever but i honestly feel that with all the research that has gone

into long covid and how ldn is being used i'm sure that's going to springboard it

further um professor angestel gleesh um

he's one of the top oncologists in the uk and he's written a chapter on long

covered and he's done a promotional video and he says i do not know why ldn isn't used as

a first-line treatment you know he is so for india and he's witnessed what it's

done for people yeah that's awesome so backing up a little bit um how is it that like with

autoimmune conditions which is kind of how like the the early this research into ldn was mostly for autoimmunity

correct or okay so how exactly does ldn and the endorphins and the tool-like receptors

go about modulating the immune system is it just because because we're not suppressing inflammation in the same way

that we would with steroids so it how how is this modulation achieved can you exist well

um dr ian saigon and dr patricia mclaughlin have been doing

studies and trials since the late 1970s um they've done hundreds

and hundreds all the papers are out there on pubmed and um

dr ian sagon always says that ldn helps regulate a dysfunctional immune

system so what he means by that is it helps to fix whatever

has stopped it from working correctly to put it back you know as near as possible and he can

back that up with all these um trials and studies that he's done

so a lot of people think that it boosts the immune system but regulating it i think is a far better way of putting it

right and i like that more because obviously your body everything works together in this intricate system and as

soon as you start to hit one thing with a sledgehammer five other things break so if you're modulating and working with

it you're not going to end up with side effects the same way that you do not typically and not nearly as many anyway

so as far as pain so it's their ldn has been used for a lot of types of chronic

pain what kind of thing responds best and why does it work for that

it actually works for all kinds of pain obviously

it depends on how long you've had the pain and getting the right dose

for example we made a documentary on pain and opioids and that is also on the

website really really interesting and we interviewed eight pain specialists

so we're talking about chronic pain um complex regional pain syndrome

fibromyalgia neuropathic pain um

so across the board any type of pain ldn can help with i mean going to

um you know really bad pins and needles

numbness all the different pains that you can have it can actually help but

again at the moment most people who end up seeing a pain specialist have been

through maybe eight or nine different doctors they've tried absolutely everything and

the pain specialist is the last person they see and they're just about ready to

give up the sad thing is i i met a lot of these

patients uh who were taking ldm for the pain when we did the documentary dr samuel demdata said to me i don't

want you just to hear from me at how well it works pain i want you to

meet the patients who take ldm for pain and their stories were

amazing these people were in tears telling me their stories how you know they've been

on pain medication for 20 years they were hooked on the opioids they couldn't come off the opioids were making them

feel ill they weren't getting pain relief they were still on a nine or a 10 every day and there was nothing they

could do and one lady she was a nurse and she had pain i think 15 years

i'm a bit fuzzy with with the time i think it was 15 years anyway um

she was on these opioids and using ultra low dose now we're talking 0.001

very very miniscule and by taking such a small amount alongside of the

opioids the opioids became more effective so what they were able to do was titrate

the opioids down whilst hydrating the ldn up getting the patients off the opioids

onto low dose naltrexone not the ultra-low dose right and the results were

we had some patients that were pain-free we had as that the pain was a three or a

four but they'd live with chronic pain for so long that they were really happy it didn't stop them from

living their lives and doing what they wanted to do and

others the pain was still bothersome i wouldn't say you know

it was nowhere near as high as it was but it was quite a mixed bag but these

stories were just amazing from these people really really amazing that is awesome so as

you're talking about the ultra low dose i actually have a lot of really hyper sensitive patients and there's many of

them where i can't give them even like 0.5 milligrams of ldn and typically in order to because they'll get the primary

effect not the secondary uh so i will often have them open the capsules and take a pinch and then we'll kind of

increase from there and they'll still get the same effect that a different patient would get from 4.5 milligrams or

one milligram so it's interesting that you do have to titrate in order to find exactly the right dose exactly and it's

not something like paracetamol take two four times a day it is really a case of

finding out the the right dose for you and nobody can tell you what that right dose is going to be

but by starting low and titrating slowly the chances of getting side effects are

minimal you know even if you are ultra sensitive but there are a few people that really do

have to take it very very slowly i definitely have a lot of those so speaking of those kinds of people for

those who have lots of immune tolerance issues food sensitivities autoimmunity

would certainly play into that as well the leaky gut leaky brain kind of a component how does ldn

assist with restoring immune tolerance okay well ldn

there are some really good um past conference presentations that go into that from

ldn experts so i wouldn't want to get into that myself if that's okay with you

no problem yep yeah thank you yeah okay so um and then there's also

i've often lately i've been using the ldn more for people who have bowel transit issues but it's interesting

again modulation it seems to play both sides of the fence when people have difficulty with diarrhea or when they

have difficulty with constipation it seems to kind of hit a reset button so is that that's something that the

literature is borne out as well right yes um

dr jared younger had a paper printed which is on pubmed um very very good

paper as jill smith had a paper published on crohn's disease

which was also well she had two actually one on pediatrics adults

which explained what they did doing the trials

but it certainly does wonders for the bowel helps as you said reset it

but if there are underlying problems um like sibo right i mean ldn works really

well for steve but you got to treat the symbol same as

celiac disease if you continue eating

junk food you know your guts aren't going to be

healthy as they should be so many people say you know why is it important not to

eat gluten and dairy but there are studies that show that

people can be intolerant to those things and it just accessibates it and makes the inflammation

far worse yeah absolutely well

it's difficult ldn does a lot but it can't you've got to work with it

you've got to help it not fight against it it's not the magic pill that you can

sit and be a couch potato and not exercise the wrong food and expect lda's

hey gonna fix you sure yeah absolutely and often i will use it in that way

where we're using that as like a reset button while we're fixing what's underneath and then we can take it away

later hopefully once we've found and removed the obstacle to cure and then done cleanup then in many cases people

don't need to stay on it long term so that's definitely but it's a fantastic tool in order to kind of interrupt a bad

cycle essentially so that's awesome um so you mentioned i believe it's in i can't remember if it

was your first year or second book on uh how ldn affects brain-derived neurotrophic factor levels uh what are

some of the potential like uh therapeutic implications of that can you talk a little bit about what that bdnf is

right i had some notes here on that just one second okay sure

um okay so theoretically ldm may be able to

reduce the bdnf levels with possible therapeutic areas from addition

to wide-ranging psychiatric disorders the current published research is on

animals um and there is still a lot more work to be done

and so can you tell us a little bit about the research into ldn with ptsd and dissociation that's an interest that

was a fascinating step yes yeah that is totally amazing um

galen forrest and ulrich dr ulrich layners

do some amazing presentations on ptsd

now the dosing for that can be different um sometimes they use it twice a day

sometimes they use it three times a day but the results they've had have been

absolutely amazing and there was a study um carried out

um which showed 11 out of 15 patients who

had ptsd saw immediate benefits i mean that is

unbelievably high isn't it and dr wick papp um she's

from germany and she works in a psychiatric hospital and she works with

disassociative syndrome so these people are in a really really bad place and

she's been working with them using ldn and has managed to calm that down i mean

it's a very complex condition to deal with and she had a

paper published on her results so i mean it's totally totally amazing

so getting away from the autoimmune the

pain the mental health issues um and the ptsd is not just

war veterans you know it's um domestic violence children who have been bullied

rapes and the list goes on i mean this is such a good tool for all of those

things but it's also used um in fertility clinics to help women get

pregnant so that's a different topic you know there are so

many things and people will say oh well you know it must be snake oil

because not one thing for so many different conditions sure

yeah but most of these conditions the common denominator going back to what i said before is inflammation

now you have good inflammation and bad inflammation the good you need

to help fight off viruses and bacteria in the body so that's fine but

it's the bad inflammation that ldn targets to um get rid of

those cold light receptors absolutely so um and a lot of times i'll

have people come to me who will say inflammation is my it is like always a bad thing and i'm glad you brought that

up that your body has mechanisms for inflammation for a reason they are there so you can fight out before an invader

but if you lose if your body loses and then that cycle perpetuates that's when

you end up with chronic illness so absolutely this is that that can be an underlying issue for so many different

chronic western diseases right so um as you kind of alluded to to this uh but any other chapters that you're

really excited about in the upcoming book for for new uses for ldn yes apart from the

covid and the long coded um the virally damaged tissues includes

other viruses so um the herpes viruses one and two

um epstein-barr virus um

now i can't remember but there were several different um

yeah yes that you can treat with ldn

and then we've got longevity which i mean he's a huge thing um yeah

drug resistant depression well interesting yeah

is is good cancer case studies they're always a really good one too

um people are never fed up with those right so and the parvo virus as well um

[Music] mixed connective tissue disease

um we've got a chapter on old op

optomatic eye conditions okay i'm i'm not gonna get it out um

i think so yeah a mold illness and cr oh wow

s yes so dr kent holtoff wrote that chapter

and he has been using peptides and ldn and managing to heal people from mold

quickly effectively and they feel so much better so what he

he did he took his chapter and then put it to one side

and said i don't like the protocol i'm going to write a brand new protocol

so this book is the first book where he's actually shown this new protocol for treating

mold i'm so excited the irs yes so

that is hot off the press really really um something very new and we've got the updated

dosing protocol because there are

so many people that still think you can only take it at night that's old

news and so many doctors prescribe it in the morning and people can then try to take

it in the evening but if you have sleep disturbance or vivid dreams you can take it in the morning it doesn't make any

difference and it goes into dosing for mental health

autoimmune pain etc etc and at the beginning book as always

we've got the pharmacology and best practices so

things change over time you know the first book was six years ago and we have

updated information in there so all in all

it's a very good book the first book was i think around about 210 pages the

second book was like 280 pages and this book is 316.

there's just more coming out that's awesome i know but i'm i can't have it the next book any longer

it's right we hit a threshold yes i can't

300 was meant to be the limit and we went over because there are hundreds of references and studies

yeah in the book fantastic so i mean all these authors when they say something they back it up

you know prove that what they're saying is right right yes

so it's a really good starting point for people who

are interested in ldn or prescribing ldn and for patients that have any of those

conditions yeah that they want more information all right so uh when does the book come out

the the launch is on the 10th of november and i'm doing a book signing

at solutions pharmacy in chattanooga in tennessee okay they're going to have a

big open house and things in the evening so that's going to be an all day thing so that's going to

be good but we're getting other doctors and pharmacists around to take

place on that day so look out for the book yeah so we're doing a pre-order right now okay

so if you go to the website if you want to wholesale it there is up to a 60

discount but on a single book we're giving a five percent discount and free shipping

if you order before september first awesome can you say what your

website is i'll also include it in the yeah but what is it it's www.ldnresearchtrust.org

and the page got it now

um if you look under resources and then ldm books you'll see everything about

the book on there but it's ldn research first dot org forward slash ldn hyphen

book hyphen three fantastic sounds great so anything i

haven't asked you that you want to make sure that you leave with our audience well i'd like to just say our caveat um

because we are a charity we have to follow rules that ldn isn't a miracle

drug or a cure and it doesn't work for everyone but i think we we covered that

yeah but it's always good to throw it out there to make sure for sure but i would also say

um i don't know how much time we have left but

there are people who think that it's okay to buy ldn

online without a prescription it's prescription only drug and when you

buy a prescription medication that has no quality control checks there's no way

of knowing what it is and our nhra which is our medicines regulatory

body say that they confiscate drugs as they come into the country and 85

are counterfeit most of them are harmless they've got nothing in there

but some of them have lethal ingredients so you're playing russian roulette so

it's not a good idea to do do that you could end up killing

yourself always get a prescription and take it to a reputable pharmacy to have your prescription

filled fantastic yeah good to know for sure so

there are several different forms how much time have we got left whatever

anything i say you go for it but there are several forms that you can have ldn

in now i mean years ago it was just capsules but you can have capsules you can have gummy bears you can have

chokies cream okay topical lotion tablets

all of the above well i mean i guess if you're doing compounding why not you can do any of the above i always end up

compounding it in capsules but i've seen it in liquid i just didn't know it had all those other possibilities but sure i

don't see why not very cool um pets um

there are quite a few vets that are using ldn also children

i mean the first thing that people think of is um autism which is um usually they put a

cream on the child at bedtime but there is also pediatric crohn's

pediatric arthritis i mean children still have lots of autoimmune

problems and of course cancer is is the big one and ldn can work really

well uh as i was saying about professor angestel gleesh he's from a hospital course in george's

in london and he did a study with dr wei liu and

they found that ldn can actually cause cell death so it can kill the cancer so that was a

big one and they had that paper published in 2016. oh awesome that's amazing well definitely look out for the

cancer chapters in the upcoming book that's great okay well thank you so much linda for all of

your time and expertise and thank you for creating this wonderful charity that's so awesome that you're spreading the word okay well thank you very much

for having invited me are you looking for a holistically minded healthcare practitioner who truly

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