DMSO, a colourless liquid, is a chemical solvent that has been around for years; an FDA-approved, natural product from trees and can be used to treat muscle and joint pain and bladder inflammation. It can be used topically to relieve pain and arthritis.
Dimethyl sulfoxide, or Dimethyl sulphoxide, is commonly called DMSO. It was accidentally discovered in 1866 as a by-product of pulp and paper manufacturing. It is a versatile compound, a small molecule which includes sulphur, and has various benefits.
A summary - DMSO has a number of potential medical benefits:
* A FDA-approved drug - as a treatment for interstitial cystitis (a type of bladder inflammation), as an anti-inflammatory compound and a treatment for shingles.
* It penetrates the skin very quickly and effectively, going into the bloodstream, and eventually to the lungs, where it transforms into dimethyl sulfide, which you exhale.
* DMSO can help carry compounds into cells.
* DMSO is a powerful free radical scavenger.
* DMSO was studied during Covid with zinc and, separately, with an Ethanol nasal spray
* DMSO can reduce radiation damage (5)
* DMSO has pain-relieving benefits due to its anti-inflammatory and analgesic properties.
* DMSO has collagen-softening benefits.
* DMSO can protect healthy cells from freezing damage during storage - it is a cryopreservative.
To understand DMSO, it might help to understand the importance of sulphur in the body
This same section has been written for DMSO and MSM:
Sulphur is a chemical element that is present in all living tissues and is the third most abundant mineral in the human body, following calcium and phosphorus. Sulphur is a key component of the amino acids methionine and cysteine, which are essential for protein synthesis and the production of important compounds like glutathione, a major antioxidant that protects cells from oxidative damage.
Sulphur is in protein plays a vital role in the formation of keratin, which provides strength and flexibility to skin, hair, and nails. It is involved in the biosynthesis of chondroitin in bones and cartilage, heparin, and insulin through the compound 3’-phosphoadenosine-5’phosphosulfate (PAPS). Sulphur is crucial to human health, supporting major processes such as cell repair, digestion, growth and metabolism.
Sulphur also contributes to the synthesis of coenzyme A, taurine, and iron-sulphur clusters, which are crucial for energy production and cellular function.
Protein-rich foods such as meat, dairy, eggs, garlic, onions, and cruciferous vegetables, as well as from certain B vitamins like thiamine and biotin are important. In particular, methionine is an important source of sulphur and our friendly gut bacteria help in sulphur metabolism too, providing we have a healthy microbiome.
Obviously, as mass market farming increases, so sulphur depletes in the soils. Worse, phosphate-based fertilisers reduce soil sulphur further.
DMSO acts as a free-radical scavenger
DMSO is known for its excellent cellular penetrating properties and its ability to act as an hydroxyl antioxidant, which can inhibit leukocyte adherence. DMSO, like many phytochemicals, can act as hydoxyl scavengers with effects on cancer and other illnesses.
A 2018 study (4) showed that it was a powerful free-radical scavenger and could reverse double strand breaks in DNA induced by Radiation damage. In illnesses caused by oxidative stress, the common view is that antioxidants like vitamin C and E can overcome the problems but they don't work particularly well. Non-oxidative hydroxyl radicals can help deliver vitamin C into cells and they can introduce oxygen into cells. For this reason, DMSO is often used with Intravenous Vitamin C to help load the desired quantity of IVC into cancer cells.
DMSO and Covid
A study (6) using DMSO and an Ethanol Nasal spray was found to lower rates of Covid-19 infections. Researchers were studying how best to protect Hospital Workers. A second study (7) looked at the combination of zinc, in the iodide form with DMSO, and found that DMSO could aid the antiviral effects of zinc and iodine, whilst improving the immune response and anti-inflammatory activity.
DMSO and cancer
Some alternative cancer centers use it, with claimed success. They may use it with chemotherapy, low dose chemotherapy, IPT and even infusions of natural compounds, all to enhance uptake.
However, the vast majority of research on DMSO is in the laboratory with cell lines.
There is research that it may stop or slow the development of cancers, such as breast, ovarian, bladder and colorectal cancers (1). DMSO has been shown to induce differentiation in cancer cells - in Erythroleukemia cells, DMSO induced differentiation by altering gene expression through regulating DNA and protein interactions. This effect was also observed in acute myelogenous leukemia (AML), where DMSO potentiated the efficacy of differentiation therapy through the manipulation of the PTEN tumor suppressor gene.
DMSO seems to be able to protect healthy cells from chemotherapy. It is also promoted as an immune system booster.
2013 research (2) when acting as a chemotherapy ’solvent’ showed that it could cross the blood brain barrier and it was suggested as a contrast agent for glioma detection. In 2015 it appeared, when used as a contrast agent in research, to neutralize MAOB, a compound important to glioma mitochondria in xenografts in vitro. Monoamine oxidase B levels are highly expressed in human gliomas (Brain cancer) (3)
DMSO has also been shown to promote the tumor suppressor HLJ1 through activator protein-1 (AP-1) in non-small cell lung cancer cells NSCLC). This effect was concentration-dependent, with DMSO significantly inhibiting cancer cell invasion, migration, proliferation, and colony formation capabilities. In lung adenocarcinoma cells, low-dose DMSO significantly enhanced the antiproliferative effect of interferon-alpha (IFN-α) and increased the sensitivity of cancer cells to other drugs, such as hexamethylene bisacetamide (HMBA), doxorubicin, and 5-fluorouracil (5-FU).
Additionally, DMSO was found to increase alkaline phosphatase activity. Alkaline phosphatase (ALP) is an enzyme that’s found throughout your body and promotes certain healthy bodily processes.
In ovarian cancer cell lines, DMSO caused a decrease in cell growth.
DMSO has also been shown to promote the tumor suppressor HLJ1 through activator protein-1 (AP-1) in non-small cell lung cancer cells.This effect was concentration-dependent, with DMSO significantly inhibiting cancer cell invasion, migration, proliferation, and colony formation capabilities.
DMSO used with chemotherapy
This ability to act as a solvent and transport chemotherapy into cancer cells has certainly excited some people:
DMSO Potentiation Therapy (DPT) uses DMSO to carry one tenth of the normal drug dose into cancer cells. Thus the argument is that it helps target the cancer cell better while reducing damage to healthy cells.
DMSO and radiation damage
A Japanese study concluded that DMSO was the single most effective treatment for patients following the 2011 nuclear plant leak in Fukushima (5) as it can repair double strand breaks.
DMSO Side-effects
It may interact with some medications such as anticoagulants and steroids, and so you should tell your doctor or oncologist if you are thinking of using it. It can cause side effects such as a persistent garlic-like taste, skin irritation, and may increase the absorption of other chemicals, including toxins.
The FDA rejected DMSO even after positive clinical trials in 1965 found that giving high levels to dogs, rabbits and pigs may have caused small, insignificant changes in the animals’ eye lens. No such evidence of cataracts or any similar problems has ever been found in tests with humans, or since with animals. Despite all this, it is actually used for animals, and for muscle and joint pain in humans today. It is available in liquid, gel or roll-on form at animal feed stores.
Claimed other uses for DMSO
If it can go inside cancer cells and can carry drugs in, what else can it carry?
1) First, a chap called Jim Humble claimed that chlorine dioxide used in this way with DMSO cures everything from AIDS to cancer. Presumably he’s a trillionaire by now. Chlorine Dioxide apparently involves stabilised oxygen. It is in his Miracle Mineral Supplement (or MMS). Apparently you mustn’t use Protocell, vitamin C, herbs, immune boosters or anything else sensible at the same time. Read more on MMS and Chlorine Dioxide here.
2) Next up - Sodium Bicarbonate. This too has been used alongside DMSO.
We have covered sodium bicarbonate on this website injected straight into a mouse tumour, and/or mice persuaded to drinking excess amounts. Injected into a tumour Sodium Bicarbonate temporarily neutralises the acid environment - there is research. But for how long? The research from Moffitt Cancer Center and Research Institute, Florida didn't cover this.
Where the mice drank excess amounts it supposedly reached the bloodstream and made the body alkaline. Since acidity is required for metastases to occur the number of circulating cancers cells fell and this was the mechanism concluded.
Two things. Drinking sodium bicarbonate will ruin your gut microbiome - it needs to be acidic to defend you. We have research on Proton Pump Inhibitors damaging the whole microbiome in much the same way, and encouraging the growth of pathogens, because they lower gut acidity.
Secondly, your blood pH is tightly controlled between about 7.31 and 7.45. If you could take you pH outside these areas, your body would be in great stress working overtime to get you back to normal as fast as possible.
We've also not seen any hard research evidence for DMSO carrying sodium bicarbonate into cancer cells.
3) Next up - Colloidal silver. Apparently you take MSM and colloidal silver in the morning to kill off the microbes that cancer cells make. In the evening you use DMSO with colloidal silver and another ’special silver’. When the microbes are killed, the cancer cells revert to normal cells.
It is claimed that this makes the treatment much more effective than many other alternative therapies.
DMSO summary
While it clearly does have FDA-approved benefits for health and carrying other compounds across the skin, does it have anti-cancer benefits in humans - there's really no research on this.
And there really is very little research you would trust to support DMSO against cancer, with or without MMS - however Miracle the latter compound.
A similar sulphur-containing compound to DMSO is MSM, or MethylSulfonylMethane.
Go to: MSM, cancer and health
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References:
- https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22814967
- https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2352396415301067
- Monoamine oxidase B levels are highly expressed in human gliomas - Oncotarget; 2016 Jan 19;7(3):3379-93.
- Dimethyl Sulfoxide Prevents Radiation-Induced Oral Mucositis Through Facilitating DNA Double-Strand Break Repair in Epithelial Stem Cells - Int J Radiat Oncol Biol Phys; 2018 Dec 1;102(5):1577-1589.
- An alternative mechanism for radioprotection by dimethyl sulfoxide; Radiat Res; 2010;51(6):733-40
- Application of nasal spray containing dimethyl sulfoxide (DSMO) and ethanol during the COVID-19 pandemic may protect healthcare workers: A randomized controlled trials; Ali Hosseinzadeh et al; MedRxiv;
- Zinc Iodide in combination with Dimethyl Sulfoxide for treatment of SARS-CoV-2 and other viral infections; Ba X.Hoang et al; Med Hypotheses. 2020 May 23;