The truth is, many people are walking around with this disease and don't even know they have it. They have been lied to by the medical community. Slowly people are becoming sicker and sicker and more aware of Lyme Disease and its devastating affects. They are having to travel either out of State or out of their Insurance Network for help. Unfortunately by the time most people find out that they indeed have Lyme Disease, they then have the chronic form and are very sick, often with many organs or other systems hit hard. This leaves the patient with the choice of paying astronimical sums of money for a Lyme Literate Dr willing to take them on, testing, and the meds they need all payed out of pocket. Sadly most people by this time start losing everything they own and the devastation it causes their family forces them to give up and either let themselves slowly die.. or commit suicide. All of this happens before they are even given that chance to get better.

Why is this happening? Three Guesses.. simple Greed. Mainly Insurance Companies are refusing to pay for out of network Doctors, even though Doctors in the area have refused to even awknowledge the disease. They are refusing to pay for desperately needed medicine and also testing. These Insurance companies wont even pay even if you have "out of network" priviliges. This leaves some Doctors who do want to help hanging in a bad position. If they do run the tests and get the patient diagnosed.. then what? These Doctors dont want the problems from the insurance company, so instead or even going after a Lyme Diagnosis, they simply disregard it. First Priority Blue Cross is one of the worst Insurance companies for this in our area..

Then there are the "other" Doctors. These are the ones who simple deny that Lyme even exists. The worst part yet, is that the strongest anti Lyme Doctors are the Infectious Disease Doctors.. the very ones who should be forced to take part in helping people with this. Are they being paid off by the Insurance Companies? What do you think?

The Doctors who have taken the bull by the horn and have decided to try and do the right thing risk unjust harrassment by the medical disciplinary Board. Of course these complaints are most often from the Insurers who have direct financial gain in reduction of the number of prescriptions and testing needed to treat the victims.

All over you read "Early detection is the key to beating this disease". How can you get early detection when you go to your Doctor and he is simply refusing to test you and telling you how rare it is? Most Doctors even after slammed with vital research information from their patients refuse to even awknowldge this disease. So who is supposed to detect this early?

Alot of Doctors wont even diagnosis the most classic cases of Lyme disease, leaving the patient with no where else to go except out of the area, if the patient doesnt have the money to do this, they simply are left to get sicker and die.

What ever happened to the Hippocratic Oath? I remember when "First Do No Harm" really meant something. Now it seems to be "First Make Alot of Money".

I mainly blame the Insurance Companys first. You can think you are protected by having out of network priviliges and thats not the case. You go out of network, pay a huge sum of money for a consultation and testing. Submit the claims and still don't get back your 80% or whatever your plan covers. I myself have been waiting for Insurance reinbursement for over a year and a half. The Doctor then orders the meds, and you get to the pharmacy only to discover there is a loophole there too.."Well, you arent covered for this one" or"You are only allowed 5 days of that one"..

This is obviously some plan to try and phase out Lyme patients because we have become costly to them. Is it our fault that many years ago our own Family Doctors didn't connect the dots and check for Lyme Disease?

The Insurance Companies financial interest in coercing Doctors to deny the pateints testing is so there is NO Lyme diagnosis altogether. Hoping that the patient will never figure it out. No diagnosis, no cost and the shareholders and Doctors sleep happy, healthy and wealthy while the people slowly get sicker.

This is what is happening in the State of PA. People are getting sicker, losing their jobs, losing their homes, while the whole family struggles to understand how something like this can possibly be happening. This is why so many suicides are Lyme connected. People are left without any options.

You either come up with hundreds of thousands of dollars for a Doctor, testing and meds, or you slowly die.

Many people don't even know they have been bitten by a tick. A nymph is smaller than the period at the end of this sentence. Less than 30% develop the classic bullseye rash and less than 50% develop a rash at all. Sometimes the rash may even be there but hidden under the hair on the scalp.

Lyme Disease is a serious infection that affects the brain, lungs, heart, thyroid, immune system, kidneys, liver, muscles, joints as well as many other systems in the body. Many people have died from complications of Lyme disease. Others have committed suicide. The 2 tests reccomended by the CDC are the Elisa and Western Blot tests. Both Antibody tests. These tests are useless. Most people after having Lyme for a long period of time have had their immune systems hit so hard that they are unable to make an adequate amount of antibodies for these tests to pick up. Some People never test positive to these tests because these tests are so unreliable. So was developed the PCR test. Its DNA. Yet these tests are completely disregarded by most Doctors as false. You can put a man in jail with a DNA test but you can't get a Lyme Diagnosis? So a DNA test is only accurate when it suits the purpose? This is a total disgrace.

Yet Insurance Companies and Doctors are using this excuse not to deal with Lyme Disease... and will let someone die for a few saved dollars.

My point in all this is.. Save yourselves some trouble. Dont come to PA either. If you live here and arent sick yet... get out while you can! If you get this disease and it doesnt kill you, the stress of the Insurance Fight and Ignorant Doctors will.

Had no success getting HMO to pay for IV, BUT on long term orals they have paid all buy the LLMD, who is not part of the HMO.

Lyme of course has run my system down causing other problems. A lot of tests are run, thousands of dollars this tear. The HMO paid them all. Of course lyme was no where to be found on those diagnosis, We are getting smarter.

there is a lyme bill in insurance and banking commitie.(pa. house). bill#1977. you can see where the bill is know? insurance and banking!..it is sooo funny ,you have to laugh..

buck's county is a joke also,when it come's to lyme treatment....there is a couple of llmds here,but you better have some deep pocket's,or just give them the deed to the ranch....gary

Aside from Dr. B I don't know of any LLMD's in Bucks County. Your best bet is to head to Jersey for an LLMD.

Today I received an email back from our Sen. Jay Costas, and updating me on the statue on the non-approved lyme bill.

I was impressed since I am from IOWA. I've heard back from 2 senators.

I like the march idea, Trout!

My 8 year old went to Texas and came back with 3 strange bite marks on her leg and developed symptoms 2 weeks later.

I begged and pleaded with dr.'s to do something and they said there is no way she has lyme because her WB through Quest came back negative.

Even ID which we all know and hate wouldn't take her symptoms seriously. This dr. told me I'm sure in a few months you'll look back and this whole think will be gone. She did give my daughter 3 weeks of abx however, I took her to an LLMD and she started tx.

The state I live in has a lower rate of lyme than a lot of states however, I know of people who were infected in this state and Dr.'s still don't want to address or treat the problem.

As a child I was bitten by ticks and they tried to tell me we don't have ticks.

It's so sad in a state like Pennsylvania they are doing this but this is there way of dening lyme patients treatment.