posted
Hello - I've been having lots of neurological issues and recently had a Western blot test come back as positive for Lyme, yet my doctor says that she doesn't treat Lyme disease. How can I find a doctor in NC that is familiar with this and treats this?
Posts: 1 | From Winston-Salem, NC | Registered: Oct 2016
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TF
Frequent Contributor (5K+ posts)
Member # 14183
posted
Once you go south of Washington, D.C. there are VERY few doctors who specialize in lyme disease and no top notch ones.
So, because of that, I suggest you be willing to travel north. At least half of all lyme patients go out of state for their care. And, in the south, it is likely a lot, lot more.
I can give you the name of a very good doctor whose practice is just lyme disease. He had it himself. He is right outside of D.C.
He only requires you to come to the office in person once every 3 months. He will do telephone appointments or Skype the other months. So, you would not have to travel here that often.
Please know that lyme is extremely difficult to cure and only a FEW lyme doctors have enough expertise to do it for most patients.
So, I strongly urge you to consider traveling to the doc I recommend. If you have not yet educated yourself about this difficult to cure disease (which is actually a number of diseases), I suggest you read the Burrascano Lyme Treatment Guidelines found here:
Burrascano was the lyme disease pioneer and the most successful lyme doctor in the world. They came from every country to be cured by him. He wrote this Guidelines document to share with other doctors what he had learned about this disease.
I went undiagnosed with lyme disease (and babesiosis and bartonella) for at least 10 years before a doctor finally tested me for lyme disease. I wasted 2 years going to doctors who took insurance and whose practices were NOT exclusively lyme disease before I wised up and switched to a doctor who followed the Burrascano protocol and had a medical practice that treated lyme disease exclusively. THAT is a lyme specialist. THAT is how a doctor develops expertise with this disease. Then, I got well.
I have been free of lyme for over 11 years now. I stick around LymeNet just to point people to the best lyme docs in the area. At least 5 of my friends got cured of lyme by going to the docs I recommended to them.
To give yourself the best chance of getting your life back, get to the very best lyme doctor you can possibly afford. That is what I learned in my over 13 years in the lyme world. Many doctors treat lyme, but very few know enough to cure anyone of it. You have to find one of those few.
You can contact the lyme support groups near you. See Support Groups on the left side of this page. You can find out from them if there is anyone near you who is curing folks of lyme.
It is my understanding that there may be one good lyme doc in NC, but I doubt that doc is as good as the one I am recommending to you.
Let me know if you want the name of the doc I recommend. You would be in good hands with him. I can give you the cost of the appointments and many happy patient reports. They are coming to him from all over the east coast including Florida and Canada and a number from Texas.
This doc can see you quickly, which is rare. Normally, good lyme doctors have a 3 to 9 month wait. And, the few top notch doctors are not taking new patients. So, that is the situation with this disease.
The longer you have this disease, the more symptoms you will develop. So, do your homework and pick the best doctor you can afford. With this complex illness, there is no substitute for an educated patient.
If you study the Burrascano Guidelines, you will then understand more of what the lyme doctor is telling you, and you will understand the treatment he is giving you. You must get to the point where you can evaluate the doctor's treatment of you.
If you just pick any doctor and sit back and wait for the magic to happen, it generally won't happen. So, educate yourself and evaluate any doctor you decide to see. If you ever conclude that the doc does not have enough expertise to help you, you must be willing to leave and go to someone better. That can be a very scary thing to have to do, but it was the best decision I ever made for my health.
Best is if you go to a really good doctor right off the bat if you possibly can. There are few really good lyme doctors. Very few.
Welcome to LymeNet! We will help you all we can.
Posts: 9931 | From Maryland | Registered: Dec 2007
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You need to be evaluated and treated by a Lyme-literate doctor (LLMD). Non LLMDs have no clue about this horrible disease or its complex treatment!
A LLMD is one who has treated Lyme disease and the co-infections which come with it for many years and has gotten patients well. A good one will follow Dr. B's Guidelines, the "gold standard" for Lyme treatment.
Unfortunately, LLMDs are far and few between. You need to go where they are. At least half of all Lyme patients travel out of state for their care.
Also, most LLMDs do not accept insurance due to the politics surrounding this horrible disease. Read poster TF's explanation, "Why Lyme Doctors Don't Take Insurance":
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