A multiple sclerosis patient who has been self-medicating herself with bee venom will speak Thursday at an annual event sponsored by the Central Texas Beekeepers in Brenham.

Alice Daley and her husband, Bill, said they initially learned about venom therapy in 1995 during a support group meeting for MS patients.

"When we heard about the bee sting treatment, we thought, 'We've got nothing to lose, so let's try it!'" Bill Daley said…

Bill Daley administers the venom once a week to his wife, who suffers from the autoimmune disease that affects the brain and spinal cord. She has received more than 17,000 stings since beginning the treatment. Some use venom in a cream, ointment or injection form, the latter of which is used on her.

"I have a record of every sting I've ever given her," Daley said. "I give her 32 stings every week; five on each arm and leg, nine on her back, one on her neck and two on her chest."
Alice Daley said that while the treatment isn't commercially available or medically approved, it works for her.

"It keeps me out of the hospital," she said. "I get bee stings every week, and I haven't yet had a crash."

And, not only is she more mobile, she said, but doctors at her last neurological appointment could no longer find lesions that had been present on her brain…

"I've heard my whole life about people with arthritis who had used stings on their knuckles," Kelling said. "It relieved people of the condition for a while."...