A Deadly New Reason to Avoid Deer Ticks - Healthy Living Center - Everyday Health

Hi my friends,

It has been awhile since I have posted on my blog. I have been battling a flareup in my Lyme disease. I am back on Rocephin treatments again. This time I have a Groshong catheterin my chest and we are using a push syringe to deliver the medicine. I am hoping that a few months of this treatment will go along ways in making me feel better. Below is a great article about Babesiosis from our friends at Healthday news.

Be well,

Richard


HealthDay News

A Deadly New Reason to Avoid Deer Ticks

A little-known illness they're spreading can be fatal, especially to people with a weak immune system.

By Maureen Salamon, HealthDay News

WEDNESDAY, July 6 (HealthDay News) — Move over, Lyme disease: Another tick-borne illness is on the rise in various parts of the country, and this one can kill.

Known as babesiosis, the disease is caused by a microscopic parasite that attacks blood cells, causing flu-like symptoms that can make it difficult to accurately diagnose. Like Lyme disease, which is caused by bacteria, babesia microti parasites are carried by deer ticks.

First documented in Massachusetts in 1969, the once-obscure babesiosis has surfaced as a significant public health threat in parts of the Northeast and Upper Midwest over the last several years. A recent study in the journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, published by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, revealed that between 2001 and 2008 cases climbed from six to 119 in New York's Lower Hudson Valley -- a 20-fold regional increase.

And many cases may be escaping detection, experts say.

"I think it's underreported. One of the reasons we're seeing more about it is because people are becoming more aware," said Dr. Peter Krause, a babesiosis researcher and senior research scientist at the Yale University School of Public Health. "The theory is that it's spreading from east to west, as if you were dropping a pebble in a pond and it spread outward geographically."

About 1,000 cases are reported annually in affected locales, Krause said, but many people with babesiosis have no symptoms and never know they're harboring the parasite. For others, symptoms can include high fever, severe headache, fatigue, chills, and muscle aches and pains. It is treated with antimicrobial drugs, such as antibiotics.

People with compromised immune systems -- including the elderly and those with cancer, HIV or no spleens -- are especially at risk of potentially deadly complications such as organ failure. Between 10 percent and 20 percent of patients in those populations die as a result, Krause said.

The more prolific Lyme disease causes similar symptoms in early stage cases but is easier to diagnose by its telltale bullseye rash, said Dr. Barbara Herwaldt, a medical epidemiologist at the CDC who specializes in parasitic conditions.

Deer are pivotal to the life cycle of ticks carrying the babesia microti parasite by serving as a blood meal, shelter and a place to mate, Krause said. Ticks also feed on birds, who serve as carriers for Lyme disease, which affects the entire continental United States. Fortunately for humans, birds don't carry babesia microti.

Krause noted that ticks need a moist climate to thrive, so dry states such as Arizona are not likely to see babesiosis cases caused by tick bites. But the disease can potentially spread to all states in an even sneakier way -- through the blood supply.

Although a blood screening test is in trials, Krause said, donors are currently only asked if they have had babesiosis, and those who harbored it but never showed symptoms can pass it through their donated blood. And because most blood recipients are already physically compromised, babesiosis has about a 30 percent mortality rate in that group, he said.

"Getting babesiosis through the blood supply is a rare event and people shouldn't panic," he said. "I don't think it will reach a crisis level, but it's still a concern."

To help prevent babesiosis, the CDC advises people with compromised immune systems or other vulnerabilities to avoid tick-infested wooded areas, particularly during warm months. The agency also recommends that everyone walk in the middle of trails and avoid bushy areas with lots of leaves or tall grasses and to use the repellent DEET and pre-treat clothes with an insect repellent containing permethrin before going outdoors.

The CDC also recommends doing full-body checks and showering within a few hours of being in the woods, as well as tossing used clothes in the dryer to kill any ticks that might be hiding there.

The authors of the study also advised clinicians to consider babesiosis in patients who have been exposed to ticks or received blood products and who show up for treatment with a fever and anemia resulting from the destruction of red blood cells.

American Red Cross and the Blood Supply

Hi everyone,

A new video informs us that the blood supply is being checked for Lyme disease and Babesia. The direct link to this video is http://www.kare11.com/video/default.aspx?bctid=969796885001.

This is an interesting video and certainly is proof positive that Lyme disease and associated diseases are getting more attention. Thanks to KARE 11 television station in Minneapolis-St. Paul for this great piece.

Be well,

Richard

Great Article a must read!

Hi everyone,

Please check out this great article from Hagerstown Magazine. The direct link is http://www.hagerstownmagazine.com/articleDetail.aspx?id=1737.



Once Bitten: Lyme Disease
For Lyme Disease Sufferers, Severe Symptoms Don’t Always Lead to a Clear Diagnosis.

by Rachel Pappas + photos by Jamie Turner

• • •

For 15 years, Hagerstown’s Sagittarius Salon & Spa Owner Marsha Knicley-Masood suffered brain fog, chronic fatigue and trouble breathing. The dozen endocrinologists, cardiologists and neurologists she met couldn’t offer a clear diagnosis, and doctors at Johns Hopkins Infectious Diseases Department assumed she had an infection, though they knew not what it was. Marsha, now 63, who once played 18 holes of golf, cut back to two holes, then to one, then couldn’t even sit up. “I’d come home from my shop Saturdays and get into bed until Wednesday when I had to go back in,” she recalls. “I felt so sick that even the sheets hurt.”

Lyme titer and Western blot tests, which identify antibodies the immune system produces to fight bacteria, found the culprit — Lyme disease. Maryland has the sixth highest prevalence of the disease in the country, and it is near epidemic proportions in Frederick and Washington counties — with the Washington County Health Department tallying 50 possible cases over a two-month period in the spring of 2010. Even so, the disease, caused by the bacterium Borrelia burgdorferi and contracted through deer ticks, is underreported in the region, say local practitioners. “Most medical doctors are not educated to recognize it, and there is no campaign to educate the public,” says Marianne Rothschild, M.D., a family practitioner in Mount Airy, Md., who also is certified in holistic medicine. Dr. Rothschild says it’s hard to recognize if you don’t get the bull’s-eye rash, a common indicator of Lyme, but one that 20–40 percent of sufferers neither get nor notice.

Marsha did not get the bull’s-eye rash and was shocked after learning of her diagnosis. “I had been tested at Johns Hopkins several times, and all tests were negative.” The disease is said to lay dormant for years in some sufferers, and Marsha’s symptoms didn’t begin until shortly after she caught spinal meningitis at 48 years old. Marsha and her doctors assume she contracted Lyme from a tick bite during one of her many childhood summers along the Potomac River, but the meningitis may have triggered an onset of symptoms more recently.

‘Under Our Skin’
While most sufferers are symptom free after a month on antibiotics, for some patients the disease is hard to treat. Even after her diagnosis and antibiotic treatment, Marsha still experienced vomiting, diarrhea, fatigue and chills. Recently, much of her pain was alleviated through three months of at-home, long-term IV therapy, in combination with herbs, probiotics and an infrared sauna. Most herbs are trial and error, but Marsha says she benefited from resveratrol, maca and others. Supplements such as vitamins B-12 and D3, alpha lipoic acid, glutathione and artemisinin have helped as well.

At her small practice, Dr. Rothschild sees two to three cases of Lyme weekly during tick season (spring and fall). She refers the toughest cases to Greg Lee, an acupuncturist, herbalist and co-founder/owner of Two Frogs Healing Center in Frederick. Greg says the biggest challenge with diagnosing Lyme is that it often looks like other diseases, such as arthritis, flu, lupus and fibromyalgia. “Another problem is that the medical community is going on old guidelines,” he says. “To this day, medical textbooks say treat Lyme with short rounds of antibiotics.” They say the blood must contain five of 10 antibodies for a Lyme diagnosis; however, more recent research suggests a patient can produce three or four and still be positive. “Some patients will go on for five years before producing more antibodies,” Greg says. “By then, the infection gets stuck in the body.”

Frank Boddicker is a classic case of Lyme caught late — eight years after he began seeing doctors who misdiagnosed him with everything from depression and flu, to sinusitis and hypochondria. The 58-year-old contracted the disease 30 years ago, before the medical community knew of Lyme. He believes he was infected after a tick bit him during a trip to Summit Point Raceway near Summit Point, W.Va., leaving the classic bull’s-eye rash days later. Frank was a fitness addict, lifting weights three times a day, running every morning, hiking and biking. Then, he was stricken with flu-like symptoms, debilitating fatigue and later Bells Palsy, also associated with Lyme.

Today, Frank lives in a trailer in the woods outside of Knoxville and is on disability because, even now, his fatigue won’t subside. “I finally found a doctor that put me on long-term antibiotics. It put me back to where I’d been for three years. I was able to go back to work.” Frank says rest and supplements have helped, as well as avoiding gluten, dairy and shellfish. “But having the infection for so long and my age have caught up with me, and I have slipped.”

For years Frank has reached out to other Lyme sufferers. He started support groups in Frederick and Hagerstown but shut them both down when members became too sick to attend. Frank still fields calls from patients throughout the Washington, D.C., Baltimore and West Virginia areas, offering advice on supplements and probiotics, and encouraging callers to find a “Lyme-literate doctor.” Marsha, too, is a strong advocate of Lyme disease awareness. At Sagittarius, she sells a film called “Under Our Skin,” an Academy Award-nominated documentary that educates viewers on diagnosis, treatment and how to find a Lyme specialist. “People I don’t even know call me every week,” she says. “I tell them to see ‘Under Our Skin’ and read ‘Cure Unknown.’ They’re excellent sources for learning how to get good care. And, when you read about others who’ve experienced it, you don’t feel so crazy.”

The Sooner, The Better
Jon Weaver is one of the lucky guys; his Lyme disease was caught fairly early. The 35-year-old Frederick resident contracted Lyme in 2007. “My symptoms began in winter, which is an odd time to get Lyme because we aren’t outside a lot and ticks aren’t active,” he says. Jon’s initial symptom was a constant tightness in his right knee, which continued to get worse. “It filled with fluid, and later my left elbow got a large, swollen puss ball on it.”

Jon thought his ailment was a soccer injury. “Being a typical guy, I figured it would go away and waited two months to see a doctor.” He then endured three grueling months of doctors’ visits and misdiagnoses, even after blood work and an MRI. Jon was scheduled for knee surgery, until the orthopedic surgeon he was referred to discovered the problem was actually Lyme disease and began treatment. “About three months after I started antibiotics I was able to hike, then jog and finally got back on the bike,” Jon says. “Getting to normal speed and strength took four months.” He’s been symptom free for several years and was told he is cured.

Doctors say more accurate tests for diagnosing the disease are in the works, including those that screen for newly identified mutations found in people with Lyme, but they are years from FDA approval. In the meantime, it is important to remember to be your own strongest health advocate. Dr. Rothschild urges anyone bitten to take the tick to Clongen Labs in Germantown, Md. “Patients can download information on Clongen’s site on what to do. I urge them to take the situation in their own hands.” Jon advises anyone with flu-like symptoms and persistent fatigue to do their homework, and consider Lyme disease as a possible ailment. “Don’t let [doctors] shrug it off,” he says. “Get a test, and get a second opinion on the results.”

• • •

A Closer Look
Knowledge is Power When It Comes to Recognizing and Treating the Symptoms of Lyme Disease.

Symptoms
• Often a red rash that looks like a bull’s-eye
• Ongoing fatigue
• Shortness of breath
• Intermittent aches and pains
• Confusion and forgetfulness
• Trouble with balance, digestion and sometimes heart problems (in severe cases that have gone unchecked)

To diagnose
• Patients should get a full panel of blood work, including the Lyme titer and Western blot test
• Take infected tick to Clongen Lab in Germantown for further testing. Visit www.clongen.com.

Treatments
• Antibiotics for 30 days if caught early, longer if the infection persists
• Vitamins
• Probiotics
• Lymphatic drainage
• Detox techniques such as infrared sauna and brushing. Brushing is circular motions with a hand-held brush starting at the feet, working up toward the heart, followed by brushing the arms, again working toward the heart.
• A diet that is low in or free of dairy and gluten, free of shellfish, and includes meats without hormones and preservatives

For more information on the symptoms, diagnosis procedures and treatments for Lyme disease, visit www.cdc.gov.

• • •

Ticked Off
Guard Against Ticks and Bites With These Helpful Tips.

Ticks prefer to live in wooded areas, low-growing grasslands, seashores and yards. Lyme disease is a year-round problem, although April through October is considered tick season, with ticks being very active in the spring and early summer. Limiting possible exposure to ticks reduces the likelihood of infection to tick-borne diseases, and a careful inspection and prompt removal of crawling or attached ticks is crucial. The Washington County Health Department recommends these precautions in areas where ticks are present:

• Wear light-colored clothing, which allows you to see ticks that are crawling on your clothing. Tuck your pants legs into your socks so that ticks cannot crawl up the inside of your pants legs.
• Apply repellents to discourage tick attachment. Repellents containing permethrin can be sprayed on boots and clothing, and will last for several days. Repellents containing DEET (N,N-diethyl-meta-toluamide) can be applied to the skin, but will last only a few hours before reapplication is necessary. Follow instructions carefully, and use DEET with caution on children.
• Conduct a body check upon return from potentially tick-infested areas by searching your entire body for ticks. Use a hand-held or full-length mirror to view all parts of your body — including under your arms, in your belly button, and in and around your ears. Remove any tick you find on your body.
• Check children for ticks, especially in the hair, when returning from potentially tick-infested areas. Ticks may also be carried into the household on clothing and pets and only attach later, so both should be examined carefully to exclude ticks.

Visit www.cdc.gov/Features/StopTicks for additional tips and information on reducing ticks in your yard.

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Loss, Pain, and Frustration

Here is another article that we read all too often. It was authored by By Victoria Ross, Springfield Connection, Connection
Newspapers, Alexandria, Virginia.


Lyme Disease: Epidemic ‘Largely Ignored’
Governor’s Task Force on Lyme disease hears stories of loss, pain and frustration.

By Victoria Ross Thursday, March 31, 2011

Tricia Platas, a Springfield mother of four, sat in front of Gov. Bob McDonnell’s Lyme Disease Task Force on Tuesday, March 24, clenched her hands together, and testified about losing her 9-year-old daughter, Amber Marie, to Lyme disease.

“It was a few months after her ninth birthday when we really knew something was wrong,” Platas said. “She woke up one morning in so much pain that she could not walk to the bathroom. This was a little girl who loved to laugh, loved to sing and dance, Amber was the light of our lives.”
Platas cried when she told the panel and 120 attendees how desperate she was to make the many doctors she saw with Amber to take her daughter’s “mysterious” illness seriously. In her frantic search for a cure, she took Amber to a doctor who strapped the little girl to a bed, and waved foul-smelling oils in her face. “Amber was screaming. I just can’t believe anyone would do that,” she said.

“I wanted them to treat my little girl right, so I wouldn’t always ask the right questions, or demand answers. I feel terrible about that,” she said. “You have to push for answers.”

Amber Marie Platas died on April 22, 2002, at Children’s National Medical Center.

Platas was one of 25 area patients and caregivers who testified about their experiences with Lyme disease at Immanuel Bible Church in Springfield. They shared stories of pain, fear and fatigue with the eight-member panel of health department officials and legislators’ representatives. It was the fifth public testimony hearing about the spread of Lyme disease in the Commonwealth.

Led by Michael Farris, chancellor of Patrick Henry College in Purcellville, the task force will propose recommendations to the governor after its final hearing April 25. Farris’ wife and seven of his 10 children have been diagnosed with Lyme disease. The task force is comprised of physicians, wildlife officials, veterinarians and other experts.

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 900 new cases of Lyme disease were reported in Virginia in 2009, a number the CDC acknowledges could be ten times higher due to under-reporting and inaccurate diagnostic tests. In Fairfax County, 250 cases were reported last year, according to the Fairfax County Health Department.

A deer tick takes about 36 hours to transmit Lyme disease, according to the CDC. The longer the disease goes undiagnosed and untreated, the greater the chances are for brain, heart and joint problems.

“We’re here tonight to listen to people’s stories, hear their recommendations and advocate for more public awareness and education,” Farris said.

A well-known constitutional lawyer, Farris is the founder of the Home School Legal Defense Association (HSDLA) and Patrick Henry College, a Christian liberal arts college that is aimed at home-schooled students.

“Lyme disease is dramatically misdiagnosed, and there is too much denial by doctors that chronic Lyme does not exist,” Farris said.

Mikey Pedersen, a 14-year-old Vienna resident, told the panel that his case of Lyme disease went undiagnosed for a year despite seven doctor visits. He said doctors attributed his symptoms to growing pains. The delayed diagnosis allowed Lyme and co-infections to spread throughout his body causing rashes, severe joint pain, and fatigue.

Kristina Sheridan, a Vienna mother of a teenage daughter with Lyme disease, told the panel her family spent four years seeing 30 doctors, visiting seven hospitals and receiving more than 15 diagnoses before they found a team of doctors determined to get her daughter well.

She gave the panel a list of specific recommendations for the panel to consider, including spraying the edges of school fields and soccer fields with Permethrin, an insect repellant, to kill ticks as well as West Nile Virus.

"I've no doubt both my kids got bitten by ticks on soccer fields,” she said. Sheridan also said parents of children diagnosed with Lyme need to understand the process for Special Education Certification for “other health issues.”

“This certification provides families and the school with the flexibility needed to handle the waxing and waning symptoms, the additional days of absence,” Sheridan said.
Sarah Beasley, a 29-year-old Fairfax woman, told the panel that she is living proof chronic Lyme exists. In 2000, she was a senior at James Madison University and participated in Army ROTC for fun. But then she started having serious muscle and joint pains.

“As soon as each day was done, I’d limp to my apartment and crash into bed,” she said. “My whole life, I had been a six-hours-kind-of-sleep-girl. Suddenly, I would sleep for 13 hours and wake up feeling like I had been hit by a Mac truck.” After 10 years and more than 10 different doctors, Beasley, the director of a local education association, said she is on the path to wellness.

At the end of her testimony, she dumped out a large bag of medications, herbs, supplements and vitamins. “Please understand that it takes all of these to keep me going in the way that I need to function,” she said. “Without them, I will be that girl that is confined again to the downstairs couch.” She added that she wants the panel to encourage research and protect doctors who actually understand “this spreading, debilitating disease.”

Marjorie Veiga, a Lyme disease patient consultant and mother of a teen daughter diagnosed with Lyme disease, said the biggest myth about Lyme disease is that it is easily diagnosed and treated.

“It is difficult to diagnose due to the unreliable screening tests and due to the migrating and remitting symptoms,” she said. “Also, ticks can carry multiple pathogens. If these are not diagnosed and treated, the patient may continue to be unresponsive to multiple therapies.”

“These heartrending cases of misdiagnosis, financial ruin, and social isolation are difficult to hear as we travel throughout Virginia,” Farris said. “But it is important to gather first-hand testimonies about the personal impact of long-term illness. One of our most important goals is to allow people to be heard.”

The final Task Force hearing on the educational needs in Lyme and tick-borne disease will be Monday, April 25, at 1 p.m. in Fairfax. The location of the meeting has not been announced.

“I was so moved by all the stories given at the meeting that night,” Platas said in an interview after the three-hour hearing. “It saddens me to see how many people are still being made sick by this horrible little bug.

Supervisor Pat Herrity (R-Springfield) attended the hearing, and has listed Lyme Disease Awareness as one of his priorities.

In 2009, Herrity, along with Supervisor Michael Frey (R-Sully), conducted a town hall symposium on Lyme disease at Centreville High School. He said he became concerned about the prevalence of the disease after hearing from many of his constituents afflicted with the disease.

“We have an epidemic that we’re largely ignoring,” he said, adding that he hopes the panel considers that one of their recommendations should be to pass legislation similar to that enacted in Connecticut, where doctors are allowed to prescribe extended doses of antibiotics without fear of malpractice lawsuits.

According to “The Connecticut Post,” passage of the bill in May 2009, which allows physicians to diagnose chronic Lyme disease, and treat it with long-term antibiotics was one of the “cornerstone moments of Lyme disease politics over the last decade.”

Similar bills have been introduced in Rhode Island Pennsylvania, Massachusetts, New York and Maryland that would compel insurance companies to pay for antibiotic treatment for chronic Lyme disease CLD.

“For Swine Flu, we went on full red-alert, but more people are afflicted with Lyme disease, and it’s time we take it seriously,” Herrity said.

Those who did not attend the hearings, but want to share how they’ve been affected by the disease may e-mail Farris at lyme@phc.edu.

Over the Edge

Hi Friends,

I need to inform you of a great new book written by a woman who has struggled with Lyme disease. Her name is Brandilyn Collins and the book is titled Over the Edge. It is a suspense novel in which the main character struggles with Lyme disease. Here is a link to see for your self, http://www.lymedisease.org/news/touchedbylyme/overtheedge.html

This book is a great read so don't hesitate to get your own copy. You can draw your own conclusions about whether you think she had done a good job capturing the struggles of having Lyme disease.

Be well,

Richard

Lyme Disease