Parasites against Rheumatic Diseases - Trichiuris suis is tested in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis

Trichuris suis is a whipworm. How could a parasite be useful in treating rheumatoid arthritis? Joel V. Weinstock had the idea that worms could be helpful in Crohn's disease; studies are under way. Trichiuris suis dies after two weeks in humans as natural hosts for this worms are pigs.

Trichiuris suis seems to work on activate regulatory T cells such as T_reg  as well as regulatory dendritic cells and macrophages. Therefore the hypothesis is that Trichiuris suis doesn't only work in inflammarory bowel diseases but also in rheumatoid arthritis. The effective cytokine seems to be IL-10.

There is a current study in Berlin, which already uses capsules with 2500 worm eggs for each patient. The study has been powered to N=50. Right now the lab tests should be under way.

And I ask myself: will we see prelilimary results at the EULAR 2015 meeting in Rome?

Links:

Two German Text on Study

http://www.ndr.de/ratgeber/gesundheit/Mit-Parasiten-gegen-Rheuma,rheuma157.html  http://www.drfalkpharma.de/fileadmin/media/studien/Stellungnahme-TSO_20110127-final.pdf 

Joel V. Weinstock: The worm returns http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3744107/ 

21.11.2016:
I've forgotten about this blogpost, but there's another one with more detailed information on the TSORA study.
TSORA, Trichuris suis ova in Patients with Rheumatoid Arthritis – Study abandoned. http://rheumatologe.blogspot.de/2016/08/tsora-trichuris-suis-ova-in-patients.html But there will be an analysis of the existing study data.