sorry you have to deal with this too

Mepron (atovaquone), 750 mg bid, has demonstrated efficacy, but should be given concurrently with azithromycin, 250 to 600 mg daily, or resistance may develop.

Efficacy is by far the best with this combination, but surprisingly, Herxheimer-like reactions are almost always seen at the fourth day, and at the fourth week of therapy.

Does this represent a newly described phenomenon in treating Piroplasms, or does this combination have heretofore unrecognized efficacy in killing Bb?

Although I do not have the answer, I suspect the latter simply based on the familiar (in Bb) four-week cycle. In late, longstanding cases, one month of treatment is the minimum, and four or more months are often needed.

Problems during therapy include diarrhea, mild nausea, the expense of Mepron ($600.00 per bottle- enough for one month of treatment), and rarely, a temporary yellowish discoloration of the vision.

Sorry to hear that you have babs...For me mepron was the great healing elixer...It worked great..I still use it off and on.

Also used cleosin and quinine..That worked great too if you don't mind having altered hearing for a week or two..which does go away right after treatment..

For me Babesia is kind of like the lyme, I keep treating babesia, I always use something to keep it in check...

I hope you feel a tremendous improvement when you start a treatment..For me it made a huge difference..

Plaquenil is an antimalarial. ( Im almost certain of that)

He did not give me anything for my babs even with the positive from MDL labs (recent previous test).

I have to wait 5 weeks for the results.

I'm hopeing that this LLMD works the insurance system and gets me all the drugs and IV I need.

I don't understand why he isn't treating for babs.

What test from MDL was positive-PCR or antibody titer? What test is he waiting for?

My LLMD uses MDL-I hope they're good.

Let us know on May 19 what happens.

Janet

don't make the mistake i made. get yourself to the best doc you don't think you can afford, and get aggressive treatment.

when i finnally got to my current dr, and i finnally got treated with a combo of augmentin, zithromax and mepron, that i finnally saw any real improvement. though, i think, i.v. zith would really help me with finnally finnally!!! mepron!!!

but my stomach has not been able to take meds for much for 3 ? yrs. so worn out.

'96 was when "i just can't do this anymore!". "99 when i got dubious lyme dx. '99 when i got un-dx by "the best" lyme I.D. in our area. my kids were ages 6 and 9 when i found the photos of our vacations to Nantucket Island with me with textbbok rash.

can't believe they are getting away with this. and i did see the post "where is your anger". not only what they did to me and my life, what they did to my family. lots of anger. just to sick to post what i want. or post to all....

Thanks everyone.

I have been seeing improvement and feeling way better just on the Biaxin and plaquenil.

The past 2 wks in a row I worked 3 days a week which is a miracle. I'm going for a third week of 3 days. at this rate I might be able to pay for a ca$h LLMD.

The medicine usually given for babesia, atovaquone, is expensive. You can get it as 'mepron' or as 'malarone. 'malarone has another ingredient as well. Atovaquone is often given with 'zithromax' (azithromycin), as someone has mentioned.

The organism that causes babs tends to be sensitive to the same meds used to treat malaria, and it has some similarities. There is a chinese herbal anti-malarial treatment that is very effective against babesia, too.

The herb is artimesia anua.
They make an extract, called artimisinin, from it that is 20 or more times powerful than the raw stuff. If you have an intact spleen (I don't), you may not even need the atovaquone or azithromycin.Compared with the atovaquone, it's cheap as dirt. (almost 2 orders of magnitude less expensive!!)

Here's a page where you can order artimisinin ('vitanet', connectted with 'yahoo').
And for raw artimesia,, try here.

I took 1g of raw artimesia, (2 caps), or one each of raw artimesia (500mg) and artimisinin (100mg) twice a day, once I got going, but started out for the first week with just half that-- 1 cap morning and evening. Thus, I started out with only the raw artimesia, 500mg am and pm, and increased to 1000mg, then for stretches substituted one 100mfg artimisin for one of the 500 mg raw artimesia.. I took breaks from it for a week or a little less, every 4 weeks, As I read somewhere you should do that. I'm convinced that it made a huge difference.
(don't worry, I don't work for any of the jokers who are trying to sell it!)
I would advise, just read everything you can get your hands on, and consider the source, as far as any dubious or conflicting info goes.
One good source for info I found was found by putting, "Dr Zhang chinese herbal treatment babesia" into google- you should get some informative pages, if they are still up. I'll try tio check now.
Good luck with it.
DaveS

Did you herx bad?

quote:

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Originally posted by Luthien:
Does anyone know how long they treat for Babesiosis, or does it depend on each individual case?

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I just feel really tired.

I have quit for the rest of the month and will start with two a day next month.

all I get is a 500 of zith once a month--I have asked my doc for mepron--but he sticks with the zith. He is worried about the insurance and God knows we can't pay for it out of pocket.

What do ya'll think? Is this enough to get the babs?

The Mepron, Zithro, & Art works wonders for me. I take mepron & art 2xday and zith 1xday. I do the 3wk on 1 off of that and on my week off i do flag 3xday, amox 2xday, and zith 1xday. I am also on supplements.

The thing that has helped the most is the mepron - art, combination. I have almost got all the babs & I have been doing that combo for 5months. I noticed that I wasn't as tired and my hot flashes & twichys have decreased alot.

I'm scared........ happy.