Ellis:

   Does anyone have any experience with Shingles and GH?  For the first time in ten years I came down
with bronchial flu in January and part of the treatment was to take a pack of steroids.  I didn't want to do this as the side
effect on the insert stated lowered immunity and outbreak of herpes virus. 

Anyway, I recovered from the flu only to come down with a terrible case of facial shingles sixty days later. 
The shingles got on the optic nerve and caused an inflammation and was quite terrible.  I am on the mend now and the
sight in the affected eye is improving daily and hopefully will recover completely.

   I was wondering if anyone had any experience with either herpes outbreaks of any kind and GH? 
My doctor told me to stop the GH immediately when I broke out with shingles for fear of making it worse.

Sammie

[Hello Sammie,

This is a tough one. I have no experience with shingles, and I have never had a question like this
before. What kind of steroid did you take that the insert stated lowered immunity and outbreak of herpes virus?

Not knowing what to recommend, I would say: take acyclovir, vitamin B-complex including espcially
B-12 injections, acetyl-l-carnitine, co-enzyme Q-10, DHEA, vitamin C, vitamin A, vitamin E ... I know you can't lose with any
of these, and they might help...

You might also try some of the anti-viral medicines that are prescribed for AIDS patients... I don't know what
combination you would use, but the idea is to interfere with the replication of the virus. Some of these are:
"Epivir" "Zerit" "Kaletra" "Viramune"

As for your doctor telling you to stop GH immediately... do as he says if you want to, but I have as a principle
never to stop taking growth hormone as long as I live because I am convinced the word "GROWTH" in growth hormone
doesn't mean it is to "make bad things grow". Ask your doctor if he thinks you should also stop eating
chicken and tomatoes? Maybe you can starve the viruses to death.

Doctors, please help with suggestions. Three stars for this post, to call attention to a difficult problem. - Ellis]