THE SYMPTOM CIRCUS

Over the years, C albicans has been blamed for a wide variety of disorders. In fact, some devotee practitioners have tended to see it as an explanation for virtually all illness.

Concerned about the lack of objectivity in the whole area, a few years ago a group of British specialists got together to pool their clinical expertise and agree on the presenting symptoms (J Royal Soc Med, November, 1991).Their “provisional” list of agreed symptoms was:

Psychological

Poor concentration, poor short term memory and lethargy. Brain “fag” that is, the feeling that thinking is difficult and described as wading through treacle, or a mind obstructed by cotton wool. Thought can be completed only with difficulty.

Musculoskeletal

Difficulty initiating physical activity. It was agreed that fatigue was doubtful and weakness not relevant.

Gut

Bloating, wind, altered bowel habit, perianal and vulval itch.

Respiratory tract catarrh

Mucous discharge from the nose, productive cough, whether or not associated with asthma, and recurrent sinusitis in allergic and non allergic patients.

General

The patients are often multi organ polysymptomatic. They have had numerous investigations, which have shown no abnormality. They often have a craving for sugar. Food dislikes are not a feature. Symptoms of food intolerance and hyperventilation may show some common features. However, it is clear that a distinct separate disease state appears to exist.

Dr John Mansfield, a British pioneer of allergy and environmental medicine, claims that when he first heard about candida therapy in the early 80s and started to apply it, his overall success rate leapt from 50 per cent to 80 per cent. In his practice, he finds that candida treatments will cure a third of all ezcemas and irritable bowel, some asthmas, joint pains and arthritis, and virtually all cases of psoriasis.

“In the old days, I had to turn away patients with psoriasis because our food allergy treatments wouldn’t work. Now we have dramatic results,” he says.