posted
Lyme was not caught for me until 1 month after being bitten. I was put on Doxy for six weeks, felt great, and thought I was cured.
Then 2 months later I began to get sick again. It is also very important to be tested for other organisms (parasites and bacteria) that ticks carry that cause illness.
According to the CDC there is Babesia, Ehrlichia, Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever, etc). You may want to strongly consider finding a Lyme Doctor to test again for Lyme and the above mentioned other infections. The earlier you seek treatment the better opportunity for recovery.
Posts: 515 | From In His Loving Care | Registered: Apr 2009
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posted
Jennie~ I can understand the money issue. There are some doctors, though it is a rare occassion, who operate under the ILADS guidelines and take insurance. There are 2 in my state, but they are booked.
Go under the section seeking a doctor and request information.
Posts: 515 | From In His Loving Care | Registered: Apr 2009
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gemofnj
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 15551
posted
Jen,
That is great news you caught your lyme so early!
Doxy is usually provided in a dose of 400 mg a day for at minimum of least 4-6 weeks.
Are you seeing a lyme literate doctor? Did you have a bullseye? Have you been tested for coinfections (which are bacteria that travel with lyme)?
Unfortunately Jen, we would love to know when lyme is gone, but that is a big question for most of us here
I am in 'remission' however I could relapse at any give time. There is no test to check to see if you are cured.
Here is a good source of information regarding lyme, diagnosis and treatment protocol.
Please do read your product information when taking DOXY. Do not take any dairy while on doxy, and DO NOT lie down within 1/2 of taking it or you can suffer serious damage to your esophagus and intestinal tract.
Do NOT go in the sun while taking doxy or you can suffer serious sunburn it minutes, and it doesnt turn red.
You may also want to consider taking a high culture / high strain REFRIGERATED probiotic either a professional strength given by your doctor, or over the counter at your health food store. (sample: Renew Life Critical Care Ultimate Flora) This will help to avoid a potential yeast infection of the gut.
Antibiotics destroys all the good bacteria as well as the bad, so it is a good idea to replace the good flora in your intestines.
You can do a search here under 'probiotics' or 'yeast' for further information.
Good luck with your treatment and hope you are seeing a lyme literate doctor as lyme is serious and needs to be treated properly. Posts: 1127 | From atlantic city, nj | Registered: May 2008
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Keebler
Honored Contributor (25K+ posts)
Member # 12673
posted
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While some get lucky with just 30 days' doxycycline, it does not adequately address all the forms and cycles of lyme's spiral shaped bacteria (a spirochete).
To be sure this won't develop further, please read on:
Doxy alone, is not enough. A combination and rotation of medicines is required.
ASSESS CO-INFECTIONS. You also need to be evaluated for other tick-borne infections as lyme rarely travels alone. The coinfections require different medicines for many months (one author below says at least 39 weeks).
Most labs do not do the right tests. You can read more about that under the test section below. If you get a Western Blot done by anyone but Igenex, they may not test all the bands or use the proper testing techiques.
LL = lyme literate (a term patients have given to doctors who are well educated in this. Being a member of ILADS is best. link below explains more).
A good LLMD's experience is best - as least to get you on a good path. There are some changes to your diet that will help and some supplements that will also help your body handle the treatment. Liver protection and adrenal support are vital. You will read more about those with Burrascano and also with Singleton's work.
If you choose alternative methods, please do so only after consult with an ILADS LLMD or LL ND (naturopathic doctor). There are some NDs who are also LL, so be sure if you see a ND that they are well educated with all the ILADS research, otherwise, they will now know enough about how lyme (or coinfections) work. These are different from most other infections, by far.
You will need very specific measures. Just "getting the body stronger" is not enough when dealing with a spirochetal infection that can morph and become stealth in nature.
All this not to scare you but this can be frightening. I found it helps to look at it as knowledge being power.
Good luck.
-----------
This is what you want to prevent from happening and why doctors are divided:
It is a tape of a great show on lyme disease done by a Boston TV station a few months ago.
When you get to the site, select the link to view the show. The show was taped by a girl on LymeNet and she put it on-line for all of us to be able to view it.
You will learn a lot about the medical controversy surrounding lyme disease and why it is so hard to find a doctor who knows how to cure a person of lyme disease.
==========================
These first 3 posts may not mean much but, after you read a bit, you'll see that getting proper diagnosis and treatment has been very difficult for lyme and TBD (tick-borne disease) patients. You might just want to glance a the top three treads to get an idea of what is being done to help change that.
CONTROVERSY CONTINUES TO FUEL THE "LYME WAR" -(author's details at link)
As two medical societies battle over its diagnosis and treatment, Lyme disease remains a frequently missed illness. Here is how to spot and treat it.
Excerpts:
Meet the players
The opponents in the battle over the diagnosis and treatment of Lyme disease are the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA), the largest national organization of general infectious disease specialists, (and)
and the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS), an organization made up of physicians from many specialties. ( www.ilads.org )
ILADS, by contrast, asserts that the illness is much more common than reported, underdiagnosed, easier to contract than previously believed, difficult to diagnose through commercial blood tests, and difficult to treat, (especially)
especially when treatment is delayed because of commonly encountered diagnostic difficulties ( http://www.ilads.org/guidelines.html - Accessed April 6, 2007).
. . .
" . . .To treat Lyme disease for a comparable number of life cycles, treatment would need to last 30 weeks. . . ."
`` . . .Patients with Lyme disease almost always have negative results on standard blood screening tests and have no remarkable findings on physical exam, so they are frequently referred to mental-health professionals for evaluation.
"...If all cases were detected and treated in the early stages of Lyme disease, the debate over the diagnosis and treatment of late-stage disease would not be an issue, and devastating rheumatologic, neurologic, and cardiac complications could be avoided..."
. . . * Clinicians do not realize that the CDC has gone on record as saying the commercial Lyme tests are designed for epidemiologic rather than diagnostic purposes, and a diagnosis should be based on clinical presentation rather than serologic results.
- Full article at link above, containing MUCH more detailed information.
-===
Co-infections (other tick-borne infections or TBD - tick-borne disease) are not discussed in this article due to space limits. Still, any LLMD you would see would know how to assess/treat if others are present.
May 2008 Volume 39 Number 5 LABMEDICINE www.labmedicine.com - American Society for Clinical Pathology
CHRONIC BACTERIAL AND VIRAL INFECTIONS IN NEURODEGENERATIVE AND NEUROBEHAVIORAL DISEASES
- by Garth Nicolson, Ph.D.
===========================
AFTER reading the articles above this will make more sense and, sadly, shows the state of treatment (and - with the new committee gathered, it is still a horrible situation for there are no real experts on the new panel):
Attorney General Richard Blumenthal today announced that his antitrust investigation has uncovered serious flaws in the Infectious Diseases Society of America's (IDSA) process for writing its 2006 Lyme disease guidelines and the IDSA has agreed to reassess them with the assistance of an outside arbiter.
You should also be evaluated for coinfections. Not all tests are great in that regard, either, but a good LLMD can evaluate you and then guide you in testing. One of the top labs is:
"With most infections, your immune system first forms IgM antibodies, then in about 2 to 4 weeks, you see IgG antibodies. In some infections, IgG antibodies may be detectable for years.
Because Borrelia burgdorferi is a chronic persistent infection that may last for decades, you would think patients with chronic symptoms would have positive IgG Western blots.
But actually, more IgM blots are positive in chronic borreliosis than IgG. Every time Borrelia burgdorferi reproduces itself, it may stimulate the immune system to form new IgM antibodies.
Some patients have both IgG and IgM blots positive. But if either the IgG or IgM blot is positive, overall it is a positive result.
Response to antibiotics is the same if either is positive, or both. Some antibodies against the borrelia are given more significance if they are IgG versus IgM, or vice versa.
Since this is a chronic persistent infection, this does not make a lot of sense to me. A newly formed Borrelia burgdorferi should have the same antigen parts as the previous bacteria that produced it.
But anyway, from my clinical experience, these borrelia associated bands usually predict a clinical change in symptoms with antibiotics, regardless of whether they are IgG or IgM."
The International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS) provides a forum for health science professionals to share their wealth of knowledge regarding the management of Lyme and associated diseases.
In addition to the usual coinfections from ticks (such as babesia, bartonella, ehrlichia, RMSF, etc.), there are some other chronic stealth infections that an excellent LLMD should know about:
METALLlC BLUE
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 6628
posted
The problem with Lyme Disease is that if you were bitten by a tick, then it may not be only Lyme Disease. It's important to see an LLMD to make sure you haven't been infected with Lyme as well as something else. Extended treatment is necessary. For now, 200mg twice per day for 6 -8 weeks would be wise to see how you respond, but you should see an LLMD along the way inbetween.
-------------------- I am not a physician, so do your own research to confirm any ideas given and then speak with a health care provider you trust.
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