Tell us a little bit about yourself:

My name is Ana Claudia, and I'm 47 years old. I'm from Brazil but I have lived in the US for the past 20 years. Currently I live in Albuquerque, New Mexico.

I found the GrassrootsHealth page through vitamin D articles on Facebook.

About eight years ago, I was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. I was 40 years old. My first flare up was very aggressive and it affected pretty much my whole body, from the neck down. I felt tingling and numbness on many parts of my body, I lost control of my right arm, I had weakness on my left leg. I was very sick for many months. Even after starting with the prescription meds, I didn't feel I was getting any better. Actually, I was getting worse. 

It was then that I found out about a treatment being prescribed in my home country by a neurologist called Dr. Cicero Galli Coimbra. This treatment involved high doses of vitamin D. At the time I did a lot of research about it, liked what I found, and decided to try. After I started taking high doses of vitamin D, my symptoms stopped getting worse and then slowly disappeared. 

How much vitamin D do you take? Do you go out in the sun?

I take 60,000 IU a day and also enjoy the sun whenever possible.

My levels are high but I don't know exactly how high because the lab where I do my tests only lists >200 ng/ml. The high levels of vitamin D are not considered a problem, instead we watch the calcium level. I follow a diet with no dairy or calcium enriched foods, and every 6 months have a round of blood and urine tests for calcium levels, liver, kidney and thyroid function, etc. My test results in these 8 years of treatment have been within normal range. Before I started the treatment my D level was about 42 ng/ml.

I recommend that patients that suffer from autoimmunity get all the information they can about the importance of realistic doses of vitamin D for these diseases. Once they are well informed about this treatment, it's easy to understand the need to keep higher levels of vitamin D. Today, there are thousands of patients following this protocol in Brazil and other countries, many of them for over 10 years, with amazing results and no side effects. Currently there are more than 40 doctors prescribing it.

I'm a member of about 50 Facebook groups and other online health forums. I try to give at least one hour of each day to talk to others about my experience so far, and encourage them to get informed about high-dose vitamin D. Until recently I've been mostly in groups and forums from Brazil, but now I hope this treatment becomes known by patients everywhere.

Ana just published a book on her experiences and it is available on Amazon. This book recounts Ana's experiences with MS and her treatments under Dr. Coimbra in Brazil.

I wrote this book because for years I have tried to talk about the Coimbra Protocol in English speaking groups, but it has been extremely difficult since most people don't like watching videos with subtitles, and don't want to take the time to use Google Translate to have access to Dr. Coimbra's interviews and patients' testimonies. I kept waiting for more information in English to become available, until I realized that maybe I should open the way, by writing about what I've learned, following the Coimbra Protocol for the last eight years.

To all patients with an autoimmune disorder. This treatment really is about balancing the immune system and halting its misguided attacks. In the book, there are testimonies of improvements for rheumatoid arthritis, psoriatic arthritis, psoriasis, and Crohn's disease. This treatment is just as effective for these diseases as it is for MS.

Do you see it making a change in the MS community?

I hope it does.

The MS community in Brazil has been through great changes since the Coimbra Protocol became known, so I don't see why the same thing couldn't happen in the US. In Brazil, it was the patients' demands that encouraged more than 40 doctors so far to start prescribing it. The same is now happening in Italy, Portugal, Spain, and other countries. When patients become aware this exists, when they realize how safe and effective it is, that's when they have the power and confidence to present it to their doctors. It's a slow process, but things have to start somewhere.

Four years ago, a young woman from Italy contacted me through Facebook. She had found out about Dr. Coimbra and wanted to go to Brazil for a consultation. I and other members of our groups gave her all the information and reassurance she needed. She went to Brazil and started her treatment. She has had amazing improvements since then, and has been telling others in Italy about her experience. Today, this young woman has created the biggest Italian FB group for MS, with over 11,000 members. Through her, other Italian patients went to Brazil, and through them, two Italian doctors have reached out to Dr. Coimbra and are now prescribing the protocol in Italy, making it accessible to thousands of people in Europe. 

The same thing has happened in Portugal, Croatia, Spain, Argentina, and Peru. So, while not everybody will be able to travel overseas for this treatment, some people will, and sometimes, one person is enough to bring about the change we need. I hope this book will help with information. Only when patients and doctors are aware of this option, it will be possible to make it available here in the US.

One day, I met a neurologist who had MS. She couldn't walk without the aid of canes and had difficulty speaking, but she gave me the name of a YAHOO group where I could get answers to some of my questions.

Another mother from that YAHOO group reached out to me and changed my daughter's life. She also had a daughter with MS and she told me about Dr. Cicero Coimbra. She explained her daughter's treatment and the marvelous care she was getting from Dr. Coimbra. I scheduled an appointment right away.

Our first visit lasted almost four hours, with detailed explanations of the treatment and what we could expect from it. We left full of hope and with a prescription for Vitamin D and some other supplements. As soon as we left the appointment, Nayra said she would never take the injections again. Dr. Coimbra had told us that it made no difference if she kept taking copaxone or not; it was up to us. Vitamin D would balance Nayra's immune system, and the disease would go into remission.

This was in 2003, Nayra has been on high doses of vitamin D for 13 years now. She has never taken another injection or steroids and the best part is that she has not had another relapse. Over the initial months Nayra's fatigue was gone; she enrolled in the school's indoor soccer team. She started walking to school again. Every part of our lives improved.

Initially appointments with Dr. Coimbra were three months, then every six months, and finally annually. Thus the years passed, with dose adjustments, regular lab tests, taking the supplements, following the specific diet required by the protocol, and most importantly, taking the vitamin D (she currently takes 65,000 IU/day).

When Nayra was 18 she lived for two years in Italy by herself, and never had any symptoms. She goes through her life as any other young woman; she studies, works, travels, rides her bike, does sports, goes to the gym. And takes her vitamins. One recommendation that Dr. Coimbra really insisted upon was that she should do everything possible to avoid stress, because stress and anxiety can trigger relapses. With vitamin D and no stress, there's been no relapses for all these 13 years. Nayra has a completely normal life. She's a beautiful, lively, healthy young woman.

In the beginning of 2015, Dr. Cicero requested MRIs so we could compare them to the previous images. And what a surprise! All the lesions on her brain and spinal cord were gone! There was only a small, almost imperceptible lesion on the brain. I am thankful to God that I was given information about Dr. Coimbra - he has given us back our lives.