What Sort Of Treatments Is Available For Lyme Disease
Dr. Raleigh:The medical community has yet to concur on the best means of treatment for Lyme disease. They are divided into two camps, including the Infectious Disease Society of America that recommends two weeks of antibiotics for early Lyme and doesnt recognize chronic Lyme. The other camp, promoted by the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society , recommends individualized treatment, based on patient response to treatment.
We here at Restoration Healthcare believe theres no one size fits all treatment protocol when it comes to a complex illness like Lyme disease and/or co-infections. It is critical for physicians treating Lyme disease to invest time with their patients. It is vital to take a thorough medical history and to have close follow up to monitor symptoms and treatment response.
The diagnosis of Lyme disease is often made using the criteria set forth in the Center for Disease Control surveillance case definition of Lyme disease, including a two-step laboratory testing approach that entails an antibody screen followed by a confirmatory Western blot.
These tests are known to miss 20 to 50 percent of patients who have Lyme disease. As the CDC says, the surveillance criteria were never intended to be used as diagnostic criteria, nor were they meant to define the entire scope of Lyme disease.
Note: A negative blood test does not mean you do not have Lyme disease. It could just mean your immune system is not producing antibodies to Borrelia.
Lyme Disease Stage 3 Late Disseminated Infection
If the disease remains untreated, a persistent infection can occur after a few weeks or months, leading to prolonged bouts of arthritis and neurologic problems, such as concentration problems or personality changes. Fatigue is a prominent feature of both early and late stages.
If Lyme disease is left untreated in stage 3, patients may go on to develop severe and chronic symptoms that affect many parts of the body, including the brain, nerves, eyes, joints, and heart. Many disabling symptoms can occur, including permanent shooting pains, numbness, and tingling in the hands or feet may develop. Lyme disease is known as the great imitator because the symptoms which display if the disease is not treated, mimic many well-known conditions such as Rheumatoid Arthritis, Alzheimers and Fibromyalgia. For this reason it is very important to find a practitioner who can perform tests and make an accurate diagnosis.
Contact LifeWorks
Treatment Starts With Accurate Diagnosis
The only way to get the proper treatment for your tick-borne disease is to get the right diagnosis in the first place and one of the best ways to do that is, if possible, to see a physician whos experienced with tick-borne diseases. Accurate diagnosis also requires high quality testing at a reputable lab. Learn more about why doctors and patients trust the tests offered by IGeneX.
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Integrative Wellness Clinic Located In Pleasanton Ca
If you have ongoing fatigue, brain fog, muscle aches or twitching, flu-like symptoms that come and go, or pain for no apparent reason — you may have Lyme disease or another related infection. Many people with Lyme disease have no memory of a tick bite and have never had a rash. Even if youve been treated for Lyme disease, these symptoms can persist. Dr. Lynne R. Mielke and Sandi Kreizenbeck, DNP, at Optimal Health Spectrums in Pleasanton, California, offer diverse integrative therapies to effectively and safely treat Lyme disease. Please contact them to schedule an appointment and learn how herbals, IV therapies, and other treatments can heal Lyme disease.
When To Call A Doctor
- A tick is attached to your body and you can’t remove the entire tick.
- You have a circular red rash that expands over the course of several days, especially if you know you were recently exposed to ticks. You may also have flu-like symptoms, such as fatigue, headache, stiff neck, fever, chills, or body aches.
- You feel very tired or have joint pain , irregular heartbeats, severe headache, or neck pain.
- You are pregnant or breastfeeding and you think you may have been exposed to ticks.
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Symptoms Can Be Immediate Or Gradual
Some people get immediate symptoms , while others experience a gradual onset of the same symptoms and descent into ill health. The myriad symptoms mimic many different diseases, earning Lyme the moniker The Great Imitator, making it harder to diagnose.
Lyme diagnostic tests remain unreliable and the classic bulls-eye rash only shows in a subset of patients. Even when present, it may appear in a part of the body not noticeablelike the back of the heador not recognizable.
Early diagnosis and treatment is key for a quick recovery, and that is where awareness can be life-altering. If left untreated, Lyme disease can affect all organs of the body, including the brain, nervous system and heart .
To increase awareness, Santa Clara County has promoted National Lyme Disease Awareness Month and the Centers for Disease Control and Preventions online Tick Lunch and Learn Series on its Facebook pages. In addition, the Board of Supervisors passed a commendation in August 2020 to recognize the prevalence of Lyme disease.
I applaud Supervisor Dave Cortese and the County of Santa Clara Board of Supervisors actions. I am confident that they will continue to bring attention to this important issue.
My family was exposed at a Santa Clara County park. The debilitating illness took us to 26 different doctors and specialists over an entire year, before a diagnosis was eventually made because of the widespread and mistaken notion that Lyme does not exist in California.
How To Approach Your Non
For various reasons, you may choose to consult with a doctor who doesnt specialize in Lyme disease or other tick-borne diseases.
If so, be sure to be as proactive as possible in providing information that could help in diagnosing your disease, and always feel free to share resources that you find in your own research to prompt discussions about any aspect of your diagnosis or treatment, including more advanced testing options.
If your doctor does not believe Lyme disease exists, reach out to another doctor for a second opinion.
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Neuroplasticity And Emotional Healing
Many people with complex chronic illnesses live in a state of stress and limbic system activation. With tickborne illnesses, the medical journey can be traumatic given the complexity, difficulty with proper diagnosis and treatment, and the disputed nature of the illness. We have learned from experience that emotional healing and brain retraining is a key part of recovery, and we support you with comprehensive programs and coaching to help heal your brain and recover your health.
How Is Lyme Disease Treated
At Optimal Health Spectrums, Lyme disease is treated primarily with a natural herbal approach. Certain herbs provide broad-spectrum antimicrobial action, yet theyre gentler and less toxic to your gut than antibiotics. We may also recommend other immune-boosting therapies to help your body fight the infection, such as essential oils, IV nutrition or ozone treatments, and nanoparticle silver. If you have severe symptoms, you may need prescription antibiotics or other medications. You can count on us to develop the best treatment plan to restore your health.
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Patients Come To Lifeworks From Around The World
Our Unique Lyme Disease Protocol has a 94% Success Rate!!
Dr. Minkoff has over 25 years of experience treating Lyme Disease and is a world-renowned infectious disease doctor specializing in Lyme Disease. He is routinely interviewed by the media and regularly speaks at Lyme Disease conferences.
The Minkoff Lyme Protocol resolves difficult, chronic Lyme Disease infections in 94% of all cases.
Our typical client has already been to an average of 12 doctors and has unsuccessfully been treated for a decade before coming to LifeWorks and finally ending their Lyme difficulties.
After patients resolve their Lyme, they always comment that they should have just come to us in the first place and they could have saved themselves many years of suffering and the runaround with other doctors.
The secret to our extremely high success rate is based on 25 years of experience. We have learned that resolving Lyme Disease requires a multi-faceted approach. Surely, the infection must be eradicated, but other underlying systemic factors must be fully resolved, or the patient wont fully recover and could relapse. These factors predisposed you to a difficult case of Lyme in the first place. We will find and address issues such as chronic inflammation, undetected infections, mold, systemic toxicity, nutritional imbalances, genetic predispositions, immune system dysregulation, inflammation, etc.
The Distribution Of Lyme Disease In California
Lyme disease is a vector-borne disease caused by the spirochetal bacteria,Borrelia burgdorferi . It is maintained in the wild in vertebrate hosts, and transferred from host to host through feeding by ticks. Lyme disease tends to be more of a problem to humans in the eastern US than in California. Differences in the tick species and the timing of the tick life cycle contribute to this difference. Our research is trying to establish the both the distribution of Lyme disease in California and the biotic and abiotic factors that influence this distribution.
Distribution of Lyme Disease in Southern California
- Do local-scale disturbance patterns influence tick populations?
- How do tick populations, as well as populations of their hosts, respond to wildfires in Santa Barbara County, California?
Moreover, very little research has been conducted on Lyme or other tick-borne disease systems in southern California. This, and other research ongoing in the lab represent some of the first studies quantifying infection prevalence and tick-borne disease risk in the region.
- Do regional-scale climatic patterns within California influence tick communities and infection prevalence with B. burgdorferi?
- Are there latitudinal patterns within California of tick density, community composition, and infection prevalence that may be explained by climatic conditions?
Effects of Sudden Oak Death on Lyme Disease Risk
Collaborators on this Project
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Recover From Lyme Disease At Lifeworks
If you havent been properly diagnosed or are still suffering from strange symptoms despite treatment, you owe it to yourself to get properly evaluated and treated.
We routinely treat patients from around the world, who come to our clinic, to recover from Lyme disease.
Most Lyme patients have already seen 6-8 other doctors without a resolution.
94% of these cases are fully resolved at LifeWorks Wellness Center.
Do Your Research And Get Referrals
You can learn a lot just by researching doctors and reading patient reviews online. You can also connect with other patients through local and online support groups for various tick-borne diseases. Asking other patients to recommend or share their own experiences with different doctors can be particularly helpful when youre trying to locate and learn about physicians who specialize in various tick-borne illnesses.
The following sites can connect you to online support-group forums or help you identify different tick-borne support groups in the United States:
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So How Does The Therapy Work
During IV ketamine therapy, dosage is determined by the patients body weight , then the ketamine is administered at a slow and controlled pace by a trained clinician. During an infusion, patients do not experience any cardiovascular or respiratory depression.
Although some people may experience sensitivity to light and/or sound and disorientation while the treatment is administered, these feelings subside quickly when the treatment is finished.
To achieve long-lasting pain relief with IV ketamine, generally a multiple-infusion approach is indicated. Most patients who have had IV ketamine feel a significant improvement after the first treatment session. This improvement wanes over the subsequent 24-48 hours, but as the IV ketamine protocol continues, the symptom relief becomes increasingly sustained.
At Neuro Wellness Spa, our trained clinicians supervise all ketamine treatments. One ketamine infusion lasts approximately 40 minutes, and the typical course of treatment includes 8-12 infusions over the course of 3-4 weeks.
Lets Make This Statewide
This needs to be extended throughout our state. Nonprofit organizations like LymeDisease.org and the Bay Area Lyme Foundation are working to raise awareness and support medical research. Their websites, as well as that of the California Department of Public Health, provide invaluable information including simple prevention strategies.
COVID and Lyme disease have many overlapping symptoms and similarities, creating the potential for misdiagnosis. In a subset of Lyme patients, symptoms can persist even after treatment, reminiscent of long-haul COVID. Long-haul COVID and chronic Lyme also have overlapping longer term symptoms such as extreme fatigue, pain and cognitive dysfunction.
We must recognize the struggle of millions suffering because long-haul COVID and chronic Lyme have become persistent infections for them. Our medical system needs resources and support to treat, cure and eradicate the diseases, otherwise the number of chronically ill and disabled people will continue to grow exponentially, triggering economic and social ramifications that will impact us all.
Raeena Lari, a resident of San Jose, serves as vice chairperson of the County of Santa Clara Health Advisory Commission. This article was published in the San Jose Spotlight.
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Integrative Medicine Located In Newport Beach Ca
More than 20,000 new cases of Lyme disease are reported each year. At OC Integrative Medical Center in Newport Beach, California, Chitra Bhakta, MD, manufactures and prescribes proprietary supplements for patients with Lyme disease. These supplements can help significantly reduce common Lyme disease symptoms like fatigue and brain fog. Schedule an appointment by phone or online today.
Contact Neuro Wellness Spa
At Neuro Wellness Spa, we have successfully treated many patients with IV ketamine therapy. If you are suffering from chronic pain as a result of a spinal injury, ketamine infusions may help relieve your pain and increase your rate of recovery.
Dont suffer in silence. Choose relief today.
Contact NWS by giving us a call , by requesting more information on our website or by visiting us at one of our three locations in Southern California. We look forward to helping you develop a personalized plan for symptom relief today.
For more information about the services we offer or whether TMS treatment is covered by your insurance provider, contact us today.
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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.
Effectively Treat Lyme Disease With Functional Medicine
Conventional healthcare often fails to identify and provide the right care for tickborne diseases like Lyme disease and coinfections.
Our functional medicine approach to Lyme disease evaluates and addresses all interconnected body systems. In addition to diagnosing and treating the core infections, we correct immune dysfunction, inflammation, hormone imbalances, and other metabolic disorders, to help you recover.
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Diagnosis Testing And Treatment
You may have heard that the blood test for Lyme disease is correctly positive only 65% of the time or less. This is misleading information. As with serologic tests for other infectious diseases, the accuracy of the test depends upon how long youve been infected. During the first few weeks of infection, such as when a patient has an erythema migrans rash, the test is expected to be negative.
Several weeks after infection, FDA cleared tests have very good sensitivity.
It is possible for someone who was infected with Lyme disease to test negative because:
If you are pregnant and suspect you have contracted Lyme disease, contact your physician immediately.
* Silver HM. Lyme disease during pregnancy. Infect Dis Clin North Am. 1997 Mar 11:93-7.
The most common co-infections that occur with Lyme disease are anaplasmosis and babesiosis. In general:
References:
Are Video Visits With A Neurologist Online Covered By My Insurance
Most insurers provide coverage for video visits at the same cost as in-person visits. You can search on Zocdoc specifically for Neurologists in Los Angeles, CA who accept your insurance for video visits by selecting your carrier and plan from the drop-down menu at the top of the page. We recommend you check with your insurance carrier directly to confirm your coverage and out of pocket costs for video visits.
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