Look into dental devices as an alternative. I have sleep Apnea and never went the CPAP route. I use a SomnoMed Advant device (https://somnomed.com/en/) and it has worked well so far. They don't work for everyone but I like that there's nothing hanging off my face every night.

That's one of the main issues with the therapy - it's hard to tell how many worms you have at any given time. You can do egg counts with a microscope, but it's difficult and takes practice. There are also parasitology tests that use PCR to look for worm DNA in the stool. I generally just go off of symptoms to get a feel for how long a batch will last and how often I should be dosing. You also have to be careful with taking certain drugs or herbs that can negatively affect the worms. With the doses most people take, having too many worms is more of a remote possibility than the population dying off, and more recently doing smaller, more frequent doses has become more popular (e.g. 5-15 every 3-4 months vs 30-50 in one go).

Recently my population seemed to get knocked out, because I experienced all my old symptoms coming back. So I take that as input to adjust my dosing schedule. At these points you can also take a dewormer drug like Albendazole or Ivermectin to start from a totally clean slate, but it's generally not necessary beyond peace of mind, and unless you think you may have too many worms for some reason or know you are having side effects from the worms, could really set back any symptom relief you are having.

You might be confusing hookworms with tapeworms. Tapeworms live in the gut and consume food meant for the host. Hookworms are much smaller (7-11mm long for adults and about the width of a human hair IIRC) and attach to the small intestine to consume the host's blood. For this level of infestation (20 worms) the blood loss is negligible and after the initial 3-6 month period they are generally well tolerated.

To echo another poster, the article summary is incorrect. Hookworms are parasites and their survival skill is not as concerned with "keep[ing] the host healthy" as it is with reducing inflammation in the gut to make the gut environment less dangerous to them. Functionally it works out to be similar with lower worm loads, but it's an important distinction.

I actually host about 20-30 of this same worm (necator americanus) and have been on "helminthic therapy" as it is called for the last 12 or so years on and off, mainly for IBD (Crohn's disease). I've found it's been very helpful, although it can increase histamine levels when I re-dose every 6-12 months. Wikipedia says the worms last about 3-5 years on average, but the lifespan varies widely by individual and how permissive their immune systems are to the organisms. With me it's about 9-12 months, but there have been case studies where you have 10+ year old worms. I have a friend that had horrible allergies and was on at the "end of the road" with prednisone treatments (due to side effects) and these were a godsend for him too. It's not a miracle treatment though, and one has to be careful about dosing and side effects.

Doctors in certain states (NY, CA and TX I think?) can prescribe these, but in most states you are on your own, and there are certain online providers that can supply the worms. Most seem to do a pretty good job, but one really needs to do their research.

A community run wiki for learning more about this therapy is at https://helminthictherapywiki.org/wiki/Helminthic_Therapy_Wiki

Never thought I'd be quoting from "A Course In Miracles" on Slashdot, of all places. But a few of the more open minded readers may find the below interesting:

“The world of time is the world of illusion. What happened long ago seems to be happening now. Choices made long since appear to be open; yet to be made. What has been learned and understood and long ago passed by is looked upon as a new thought, a fresh idea, a different approach. Because your will is free you can accept what has already happened at any time you choose, and only then will you realize that it was always there.” (ACIM, M-2.3)

"What God did not create does not exist. And everything that does exist exists as He created it. The world you see has nothing to do with reality. It is of your own making, and it does not exist." (ACIM Workbook-pI.14.1:2-5)

The above quote is useful to understand this one: “In order to understand the teaching-learning plan of salvation, it is necessary to grasp the concept of time that the course sets forth. Atonement corrects illusions, not truth. Therefore, it corrects what never was. Further, the plan for this correction was established and completed simultaneously, for the Will of God is entirely apart from time. So is all reality, being of Him. The instant the idea of separation entered the mind of God's Son, in that same instant was God's Answer given. In time this happened very long ago. In reality it never happened at all.” (ACIM, M-2.2)

Not trying to "spiritualize" quantum physics, simply to point out some potential similarities. Spiritual masters such as the historical Buddha and Jesus had an interesting insight into the same kind of questions that modern physics is only starting to explore.

How about a free tshirt for the folks that have been with the site since day 1 (e.g. userID 1000) and are still daily readers? :p