posted
Got a a rash in mid june, wasn't sure if it was lyme but compared to the pictures online it looked similar to it. I had 2 blemishes, The only thing is that my rash had only one central clearing, not like a bullseye that has 2 rings and then a central clearing in the middle. ALso my rash didn't expand like it says online. It jus stayed the same size, approx. the size of a nickel.
Anyway, Just to be safe I visited a regular doctor in late July who put me on doxy for a month. I started taking the doxy on the first week of Aug. He put me on 200mg a day, but i requested a higher dose. so i upped the dose to 400mg and did the course for a month. I didn't have any symptoms before starting doxy (no fever, no fatigue, no joint pain).
While on the treatment i noticed i was more fatigued than usual, but read that it could be a side effect of the doxy itself. I finished the treatment with no real herx or any other symptoms.
I decided to get bloodwork done in Oct. (a month after i finished taking doxy)to make sure i was cured of lyme. I tested through igenex western blot # 188 & 189. The result came in today and my doctor said its positve but very low positive (told me this was over the phone). I"m gonna get copies of the test results to find out specificaly which bands.
My question is: Is it possible to test positive for lyme even if your cured or in remission?
Posts: 27 | From NYC | Registered: Jul 2009
| IP: Logged |
groovy2
Frequent Contributor (1K+ posts)
Member # 6304
posted
It is possible that if treated Very early after infection that one month of doxi at 400mg per day could kill the germs off --
Post your test results and give specific date of infection and date of starting treatment--Jay--
Posts: 2999 | From Austin tx USA | Registered: Oct 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
You will likely test positive if you had lyme. The test measure your antibody response. Those antibodies can remain in your body for months to years, even though you may not be infected.
However, if you test negative, it doesn't mean you didn't have lyme. It just means you were treated before your body had a chance to elicit an immune response.
IgM response is usually the first set of antibodies to respond to infection and can often mean active infection (however, keep in mind that these can linger in your body for months and may not mean you are still infected). IgG antibodies are the second set of responders and can remain in you body for years.
Listen to your body....if you feel good, put lyme disease behind you. It sounds as though you caught it early and treated aggressively so my bet is that you sufficiently treated. If you don't feel good, I'd put lyme back on the table for consideration. Unfortunately the tests cannot really be relied upon to indicate whether you have appropriately treated or not.
Posts: 561 | From mass | Registered: Jul 2007
| IP: Logged |
The Lyme Disease Network is a non-profit organization funded by individual donations. If you would like to support the Network and the LymeNet system of Web services, please send your donations to:
The
Lyme Disease Network of New Jersey 907 Pebble Creek Court,
Pennington,
NJ08534USA http://www.lymenet.org/
UBBFriend: Email this page to someone!
Printer-friendly view of this topic