posted
My son who is 16 was diagnosed with lyme a year ago. He has had it for a while but we didn't catch it until a knee "injury" would not resolve. He plays basketball and didn't remember injuring it but it wouldn't get better.
Anyway, this summer it is his ankle/foot. No memory of injuring it. MRI showed that all the muscles around the tendon are inflamed. He cannot get a shoe on without pain. He has been in a boot for 6 weeks.
Currently he take malarone, biaxin, mino, and flagyl.
Ortho said it is not and ortho issue and wants us to go to a rheumatologist (some marker showed up in a blood test).
LLMD wants to see him first and mentioned adding plaquenil.
What does plaquenil do?
Will it help with the swollen foot?
Anyone have any ideas as to how to get the swelling down? He is on anti-inflammatories, ice, and elevation.
Posts: 832 | From Somewhere | Registered: Nov 2010
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TNT
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 42349
posted
quote:Originally posted by terv: My son who is 16 was diagnosed with lyme a year ago. He has had it for a while but we didn't catch it until a knee "injury" would not resolve. He plays basketball and didn't remember injuring it but it wouldn't get better.
Anyway, this summer it is his ankle/foot. No memory of injuring it. MRI showed that all the muscles around the tendon are inflamed. He cannot get a shoe on without pain. He has been in a boot for 6 weeks.
Currently he take malarone, biaxin, mino, and flagyl.
Ortho said it is not and ortho issue and wants us to go to a rheumatologist (some marker showed up in a blood test).
LLMD wants to see him first and mentioned adding plaquenil.
What does plaquenil do?
Will it help with the swollen foot?
Anyone have any ideas as to how to get the swelling down? He is on anti-inflammatories, ice, and elevation.
It sounds lyme-related to me, and I sure don't see how adding Plaquenil to that drug line-up will help anything! It will probably make it worse.
They probably think his body is attacking itself (was the marker you refer to an elevated RA factor or positive ANA?) and thus want to put him on the Plaquenil. It's used for treatment for Lupus and autoimmune disease, but is a known anti-malarial and borrelia cyst-busting drug.
I think you will have more success by using a Penicillin or Cephalosporin as that will target the lyme, which, in my opinion, is more likely causing this problem. Many lyme patients have had a positive ANA or RA that eventually turned negative after effective lyme treatment.
A bacteria is more likely to cause a soft tissue infection than a protozoan. My opinion is it's probably the borrelia, but could even be Bart or BLO (Bartonella-like organism).
What infections did he test positive for when he was tested for lyme?
Posts: 1308 | From Eastern USA | Registered: Oct 2013
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posted
He originally had various seemingly unconnected health issues and was seeing an ENT, allergist, gastronenterologist, orthopedic, and pulmonologist. Not normal for a 15 year old. The final straw was a swollen knee after no known injury.
His initial lab results show he was tested for the Western Blot (Igg band 41) and Mycoplasma pneumoniae (negative).
He tested positive for Igg band 41 twice in a row and was treated for lyme. He immediately had herx symptoms including the other knee swelling up within 2 days of beginning treatment.
After 12 months of treatment many symptoms have resolved. Most amazing was the exercise induced asthma which disappeared after a couple months of treatment. Sore joints in hands, knee swelling and soreness, mental fog, etc... Over that time some new symptoms appeared. One was POTS like but it also resolved.
The latest is the inflammation of muscle in the foot. MRI showed no tendon damage. Blood tests showed HLA-B27 present. Ortho doctor wanted to send him to a rheumatologist but LLMD says she is not concerned with that test and thinks plaquinel will help.
Posts: 832 | From Somewhere | Registered: Nov 2010
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