The Most Accurate Lyme Disease Test
Many of the patients we see have already been tested and told they didnt have Lyme disease but continued to suffer from classic Lyme symptoms.
When we re-test these individuals with our extremely sensitive Lyme test, almost all cases are confirmed to be infected with Lyme. This is due to the sensitivity of the Lyme test we use.
Late Or Chronic Lyme Disease Treatment
Experts agree that the earlier you are treated the better, since early treatment is often successful. Unfortunately, a substantial portion of patients treated with short-term antibiotics continue to have significant symptoms. The quality of life of patients with chronic Lyme disease is similar to that of patients with congestive heart failure. Doctors dont agree about the cause of these ongoing symptoms. The primary cause of this debate is flawed diagnostic testing. There is currently no test that can determine whether a patient has active infection or whether the infection has been eradicated by treatment.
The IDSA thinks Lyme disease symptoms after treatment represent a possibly autoimmune, post-Lyme syndrome that is not responsive to antibiotics. The IDSA essentially regards Lyme disease as an acute infection like strep throat that can be treated with a short course of antibiotics. The IDSA guidelines are now eight years old and do not reflect recent science.
ILADS physicians believe that ongoing symptoms probably reflect active infection, which should be treated until the symptoms have resolved. These physicians use treatment approaches employed for persistent infections like tuberculosis, including a combination of drugs and longer treatment durations. The ILADS guidelines have just recently been updated using a rigorous review of the medical literature.
Lyme Controversial From The Start
In autumn 1975, Polly Murray, an artist and mother of four in Lyme, reported to the state health department that she and her children were suffering from mysterious maladies, including stiff and swollen knees and rashes. And neighboring children were having similar hard-to-explain symptoms.
Physicians diagnosed the children with juvenile rheumatoid arthritis. Another mother from the area, Judith Mensch, also contacted the state health department. Finally, the cluster aroused the attention of the Connecticut public health authorities. Yale Universitys Dr. Allen Steere, who was still a rheumatologist-in-training, began searching for a cause.
The following year, Steere told the Journal of the American Medical Association, that he strongly suspected the illness came from some type of infection.
In the early 1980s, Willy Burgdorfer, a medical entomologist at Rocky Mountain Laboratories, identified the bacterium that caused the mysterious affliction. It was named Borrelia burgdorferi after him.
Robert A. Aronowitz, a medical historian at the University of Pennsylvania, said the divide between mainstream medicine and Lyme patient advocates started early with Patty Murray herself. He noted that Murray created local Lyme support groups starting in the 1980s that began to position themselves “in opposition to the leading Lyme disease physicians and scientists and their view of the disease.”
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Working With A Lyme Literate Medical Doctor Is Best
Based on the October 3 study, patients did best if they worked with a physician who specializes in treating Lyme disease. These types of physicians are known as Lyme Literate Medical Doctors . Although family physicians, pediatricians, internist, and naturopathic physicians may try to treat Lyme without specific training or practice focus, they tend not to help patients as much as LLMDs.
In General Tick Borne Disease Or Lyme Disease Should Be Treated With Antibiotics Usually These Antibiotics Should Be Pharmaceuticals Although Augmentation With Botanical Antibiotics Can Be Even More Effective Than Pharmaceutical Therapies Alone
Unfortunately in late Lyme, antibiotics alone are often not sufficient. Some patients are genetically or epigenetically predisposed to chronic Lyme disease. Often the underlying conditions must be addressed along with the infection.
Borrelia burgdorferi has been called the second great pretender, after syphilis. Like syphilis it is a spirochete , and the spirochete goes to the brain and spinal cord as fast as it can get there. In addition like syphilis it grows very slowly. Unlike syphilis it is relatively smart in the bacterial world, having the largest genome of any other bacteria. Borrelia burgdorferi is able to crawl inside of cells, thus avoiding immune detection, hide in the brain and spinal cord, where our immune system is careful not to cause too much inflammation. More recent data suggests it may, like many of its co infecting microbes be able to fool the immune system and manipulate the immune response so that the immune system thinks that there is not an infection. In 3 animal models dog, mouse and monkey, chronic persistent infectious borrelia infection has been proven after short course antibiotic. This provides evidence that the cure of chronic Lyme disease in many patients will take more than 1-3 months of antibiotics.
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Payment Policies & Insurance
Payment is expected at the time of your visit either by cash, check, or credit card. Office charges may or may not be covered by your insurance plan. We are considered out of network so it will depend on your individual insurance policy and the coverage of that policy as to the services and amounts they may reimburse. If youd like to check with your insurance company prior to your appointment, visits are typically considered level 5 office visits.
Our office does not bill your insurance directly but we will gladly provide an invoice at the conclusion of your visit with your diagnosis codes, treatment codes and all pertinent provider information to you so that you may send it to your insurance company for reimbursement of billable services. We are also not a participating provider in Medicaid or Medicare.
Doctors Debate Patients Suffer: The Fight Over Chronic Lyme Disease In Wisconsin
- Sunday, March 13, 2022, 6:50am
If life had gone as planned, Maria Alice Lima Freitas would be in medical school, inspired by the career of her father, a surgeon who practiced in Brazil. But instead of changing careers, the 49-year-old therapist retired from University of Wisconsin-Madison.
Freitas says her undiagnosed Lyme disease has sapped her energy, fogged her thinking and caused pain in her neck, shoulders, hands and right knee. She has three times deferred her entrance into medical school while struggling with myriad symptoms that she attributes to Lyme.
Most of her doctors say she is mistaken, and that her symptoms, which began in 2015, are due to rheumatoid arthritis, or RA.
Freitas is among thousands of Wisconsinites who say they are suffering from a chronic or long-term version of the disease. The infection comes from tiny ticks primarily found in the northeastern United States, including in Wisconsin which is a hot spot for Lyme, ranking No. 5 among states for Lyme cases in 2019.
Nationally, Lyme disease infects an estimated 476,000 people a year. The Wisconsin Department of Health Services reports the state had 3,076 estimated cases of Lyme disease in 2020 a doubling in the past 15 years. But medical entomologists say Lyme cases in the state could be 10 times higher than reported.
“The best way I can explainIm going through hell, keep on going,” Freitas said.
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Conversation: Dementia And Lyme Disease
Dementia and Lyme disease are common. Kris Kristofferson was thought to have suffered from Alzheimers disease for ten years before he was diagnosed with Lyme disease. Two other individuals who were thought to suffer from dementia before being diagnosed with Lyme disease were also described in my book, Lyme Disease takes on Medicine. I will discuss these three cases during my next live Lyme Hangout Tuesday, March 27, 8PM EST.
Host: Dr. Daniel Cameron
What Do I Expect During My Appointment
Your first visit with Dr. Daniel Cameron will begin with introductions to our staff, and will include a a comprehensive evaluation, which will include obtaining a thorough medical history, reviewing prior medical records and test results, and performing a physical exam. Additional laboratory and diagnostic tests and/or consultations with specialists may be needed.
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Azlocillin An Amazing Compound
The study team first tested to see whether different doses of the drugs could kill drug-tolerant borrelia bacteria grown on laboratory plates better than a standard Lyme disease antibiotic .
They carried out each experiment three times in triplicate . The team tested the drugs on different ages of bacteria, colonies that were 3 days old and growing rapidly, and colonies that were 710 days old and had reached a growth plateau.
At high concentrations, both drugs could kill all the drug-resistant borrelia cells and outperformed the standard Lyme disease antibiotic. When the study team tested the drugs at lower doses, azlocillin outperformed the standard antibiotic and cefotaxime, which left 20% of the drug-resistant cells alive.
The researchers tested the drugs in a small number of laboratory-bred mice that they infected with the bacteria. They treated the mice at different stages of the disease at 7, 14, and 21 days after infection.
They gave each mouse a daily dose of either azlocillin, cefotaxime, or the standard treatment for Lyme disease for 5 days. They cultured the mouse organs and checked for live bacteria using microscopy and genetic testing 2 days after the last dose.
The researchers found that both the standard treatment and azlocillin completely cleared the infection in the early stages of the disease, while cefotaxime did not.
We have been screening potential drugs for 6 years, Venkata Raveendra Pothineni, Ph.D., the lead study author says.
Two Camps Two Approaches
Freitas saw a long string of mainstream physicians for a diagnosis rheumatologists, an infectious-disease specialist, family medicine doctors and emergency room physicians. Then, in the spring of 2020, she began seeing out-of-network doctors in and outside of Wisconsin, and many of them didnt take insurance.
A survey of more than 2,400 U.S. patients found 50 percent of the respondents reported seeing at least seven physicians before a Lyme diagnosis, and more than half continued to suffer symptoms for at least six months after the recommended short course of antibiotics.
In January 2021, Freitas borrowed $4,000 from her mother-in-law and flew to Washington, D.C., to receive intravenous antibiotic therapy. The treatments failed to help in fact she dropped 30 pounds in a matter of weeks. “I thought I was gonna die because I couldnt eat,” Freitas said.
Maria Alice Lima Freitas pays about $1,200 a month for medicine, vitamins and treatment for her chronic Lyme disease. She is pictured at her home in Middleton, Wis., on Oct. 6, 2021, with her husband John Oppenheimer. Freitas is now being treated by Dr. Samuel Shor of the Tick-Borne Illness Center of Excellence in Woodruff, Wisconsin. She says her brain is still sometimes foggy but emotionally she is much better and feels optimistic that a doctor is finally taking her symptoms seriously. Coburn Dukehart/Wisconsin Watch
“Signs and symptoms may wax, wane and migrate,” they wrote.
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Azlocillin Comes Out On Top
The drug, which is not on the market, was tested in mouse models of Lyme disease at seven-day, 14-day and 21-day intervals and found to eliminate the infection. For the first time, azlocillin was also shown to be effective in killing drug-tolerant forms of B. burgdorferi in lab dishes, indicating that it may work as a therapy for lingering symptoms of Lyme disease.
Pothineni and Rajadas have patented the compound for the treatment of Lyme disease and are working with a company to develop an oral form of the drug. Researchers plan to conduct a clinical trial.
Rajadas is also a professor of bioengineering and therapeutic sciences at the University of California-San Francisco.
Other Stanford co-authors are Hari-Hara S. K. Potula, PhD, senior research scientist postdoctoral scholars Aditya Ambati, PhD, and Venkata Mallajosyula, PhD senior research scientist Mohammed Inayathullah, PhD and intern Mohamed Sohail Ahmed.
A researcher at Loyola College in India also contributed to the work.
The study was funded by the Bay Area Lyme Foundation and Laurel STEM Fund.
- Tracie White
How To Spot And Remove Ticks
If you find a tick attached to your body, carefully pull it out using tweezers. Dont squeeze too hard because this could hurt the animal. If theres any doubt about whether the tick has been removed completely, leave it where it was until someone else removes it.
You should check yourself regularly for ticks while walking through woodland, especially at dusk and dawn. Youll need to keep looking down so you dont miss any ticks.
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About The Steven And Alexandra Cohen Foundation
The Steven & Alexandra Cohen Foundation is committed to inspiring philanthropy and community service by creating awareness, offering guidance, and leading by example to show the world what giving can do. The Foundations grants support nonprofit organizations based in the United States that either help people in need or solve complex problems. The Foundation also spearheads grassroots campaigns to encourage others to give. For more information, visit www.steveandalex.org.
Genomic Insights From Borreliaceae Lineages
Between 1982 and 2010, the B. burgdorferi species complex, known as B. burgdorferi sensu lato, steadily expanded from 1 to 18 species as isolates from tick vectors, their hosts, and patient samples were characterized . A subset of these species are associated with human disease. B. burgdorferi sensu stricto in the USA, as well as B. afzelii and B. garinii in Eurasia are the most common agents of LD in the Northern hemisphere. Cases of LD in Europe are also caused by Bb and B. bavariensis , but are less common. B. spielmanii , B. bisettiae , and B. lusitaniae have been identified in human specimens but their clinical importance is less clear. B. valaisiana has been identified in human specimens , but others have recently provided compelling reasons why existing evidence does not support it being considered a human pathogen . Additional species have been identified in tick vectors or their hosts, but not in patient samples.
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The Best Lyme Disease Treatment And Much More
Many people fear Lyme disease because of its long term effects upon those who contract it. However, medical science has found newer methods to treat this widespread disease. If you have special health circumstances, the best Lyme disease treatment may include natural herbs and alternative treatments.
If you are interested in health and lifestyle topics, then why not check out our other blog articles to see how we can help you today.
Patrick is a Berlin-based dating advisor, motivational speaker, a huge fitness and vegan diet enthusiast and the main editor at Wingman Magazine, specialised in men’s health. His ultimate goal is to share with men around the world his passion for self-development and to help them to become the greatest version of themselves. He believes a healthy body and successful social interactions are two main keys to happiness.
What Is The Best Antibiotic For Lyme Disease
The best anitbiotic for Lyme disease is Doxycycline. Doxycycline was the first to be found, and it works on both ticks and Lymecycline in ring form. Doxycycline combined with amoxicillin has proved to provide an even better results. The only downside of doxycyclines is that people under age 35 have higher chances of developing acne. And while others are being studied, so far there has not been a magic bullet against the bacterial family of Borrelia burgdorferi, which causes Lyme disease after an incubation period ranging from 3 days to months before any associated symptoms are experienced . It can take anywhere from 2-6 weeks for antibiotics or other treatments to kill all of the bacteria.
Doxycycline is an antibiotic used to treat infections such as Lyme disease and other tick-borne diseases, acne , rosacea, chlamydia , and others.
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Transmission Of Bb Via Ixodes Spp Vectors
The black-legged ticks, Ixodes scapularis and Ixodes pacificus on the West Coast, are the primary vectors of Bb in the USA. In endemic areas, the proportion of Ixodes spp. ticks infected with Bb can be remarkably high. One recent survey of the pathogen burden of 197 Ixodes scapularis ticks collected from New York and Connecticut where LD is endemic, revealed 111 ticks were infected with Bb and 37 were co-infected with more than one human pathogen . The high pathogen burden is consistent with previous tick surveys in the same region . In contrast, the percent of infected ticks in other regions of the USA is much lower. In recently published surveys across California, for example, fewer than 5% of Ixodes spp. ticks were infected . Ixodes ticks sometimes carry multiple strains of Bb that may impact the course of disease in people that are co-infected. One tick survey showed that 39% of Ixodes ticks in North America are infected with multiple genotypes of Bb .
Biorepositories And Research Cohorts
Well-characterized samples are an essential tool to help researchers develop and validate new diagnostic tests and to better understand the complexities of LD. Well-characterized sample sets can benefit medical providers, test developers, and the public at risk for LD . It is critical that sample users understand the criteria used to enroll participants, how samples were collected and stored, and what additional clinical and testing data may be available. Additional benefits can be realized when multiple sample users are using the same well-characterized sample sets. Current sample sets available for researchers include the CDC Lyme Serum Repository , the Lyme Disease Biobank , and samples from the Studies of Lyme Immunology and Clinical Events at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine. Additionally, some investigators also have their own sample collections with, in some cases, blood samples, skin biopsy specimens and synovial fluid which form the basis for collaborative studies .
Lyme Disease Biobank
Lyme Disease Research Center
Long Island Outdoor Worker Cohort
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