Lyme Disease Continues its Spread

Lyme Disease Continues its Spread, MetroWest Daily News & Milford Daily News

• 
  
• 
  

  By Laura Henze Russell/Guest Columnist

  Posted Aug. 24, 2015 at 1:39 PM 

  Wonder if there is a Lyme epidemic in Massachusetts? The MetroWest had some of the highest incidence rates in Massachusetts in 2013. Middlesex County had a 450 percent growth rate in reported Lyme cases from 1997-2001 to 2007-2011, and the largest number of cases of any county in the commonwealth.

  A CDC map shows Lyme marching on – along with nasty co-infections ticks carry – from its discovery in 1981 in Connecticut and Long Island, New York, throughout the Northeast and MidAtlantic to the Upper Midwest, with beachheads scattered in the Midwest, West and South. The first diagnosed cases came from the Lyme, Connecticut, area.

  Official cases reported to the Centers for Disease Control (CDC) have risen to 30,000. CDC officials say the real number is about 10 times more, 300,000, based on a survey of clinical testing labs (2008) and medical insurance claims (2005-2010). Observers say it is much higher now, as it seems almost every family has someone touched by Lyme – sometimes many times.

  Why is Lyme a big deal? Caught early, a short course of doxycycline is usually sufficient. Some doctors prefer doxycycline monohydrate capsules to the cheaper generic hyclate, and it has been reported to cause less nausea than that tablet form. When Lyme – transmitted by tick bites – is treated early, the parasite is killed before it can establish its reproductive life cycle in the body.

  When it is not caught early, there is potential for longer-term illness and complications as the reproductive cycle is established within the body. There is controversy over whether the parasite is still present, perhaps in cyst form, or hiding in biofilm, spinal fluid, or other hard-to-treat areas, waiting to emerge again, especially in those whose immune systems are now compromised. The CDC disagrees, and calls it "Post-treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome" (PTLDS) as a result of immune changes instead of ongoing infection.

  Some physicians with extensive experience treating Lyme patients, who belong to International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS) and are called “Lyme literate” doctors, call it chronic Lyme or persistent Lyme. Lyme disease symptoms vary greatly among people, and also by staging of the disease. Seventy percent got the telltale rash which is not always present and fades with time, 30 percent arthritis, 9 percent facial paralysis (Bell’s palsy), and 6 percent nerve pain, brain swelling (encephalitis) or heart problems.

  According to specialists like Dr. Richard I. Horowitz, author of “Why Can't I Get Better?” Solving the Mystery of Lyme and Chronic Disease,” Lyme is a “great imitator” of many chronic diseases, including chronic fatigue syndrome, fibromyalgia, autoimmune conditions like M.S., psychiatric conditions like depression and anxiety, and it also causes significant memory and concentration problems, mimicking early dementia. He writes that co-infections are a significant and growing factor in tick-borne diseases. They require different tests and different treatments.

  Diagnosis, testing and treatment are all the subject of controversy, but there has been movement to recognize the validity of both ILADS and Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) guidelines, to get insurance to cover more forms of treatment, and to stop disciplining doctors who use the ILADS guidelines. The Massachusetts legislature passed a law to that effect, and efforts are underway in Congress.
  

  What does all this mean for us?

  First, do your best to avoid ticks like the plague, spray your yard and clothes, wear tick protective clothing, and do thorough daily tick checks of children, pets and you. If you find one embedded, use special tweezers and techniques or have it removed or it may break off and flood you with a full exposure to Lyme immediately, as happened to me last year, so I caught it again.

  Second, if you see or suspect you have a tick bite, have a bull’s-eye rash or have fever, pain or Lyme-like symptoms, get to a doctor right away. Early antibiotic treatment now can forestall months, years or a lifetime of costly, debilitating, and harder to treat health problems.

  Third, if you are sick and tired with fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome, arthritis and other migrating pains, brain fog, memory loss, neurological or other mystery symptoms, don’t just chalk it up to aging. Even if you have been treated for Lyme disease in the past, it may not have been the right protocol to rid Lyme and co-infections from your system, or you may have been reinfected by another bite. Find an ILADS doctor and get another opinion.

  Fourth, it is time for broader action. Dr. Horowitz outlines a plan for Centers for Excellence in treating Lyme and Chronic Diseases. Congress is starting to pay attention. Massachusetts needs to do more. It is high time to march on Lyme.

  For diseases like HIV/AIDS, there are public education and screening programs, and aggressive coverage of lifetime therapies to forestall progression of disease. For diseases like malaria, there is prophylactic treatment routinely prescribed for the duration of travel and living in areas where it is endemic. Is such an approach needed for Lyme? Do we need prophylaxis in season? Do we need routine tests and screening? Can we develop safe and effective vaccines against “tick spit?”

  For Eastern equine encephalitis and West Nile, we have county mosquito control programs. It is harder for Lyme as tick habitat is everywhere, not just stagnant water. Would deer control help? Driving to Dr. Richard Horowitz’s excellent “Living Well with Lyme” weekend workshop at the Omega Institute in New York’s Hudson Valley, I nearly hit a deer as it sped across six lanes of the Mass Pike a few hundred yards ahead. Not long after, a dead deer lay on the median. Do we put up deer warning signs on the Pike like the Hudson Valley highways, and take steps to control the booming population?

  
  

  Hearing stories of misdiagnosis, pain and denial faced by many at the workshop, one got the sense that the U.S. has stronger laws to protect deer than patients with complex chronic diseases. Can we recognize Lyme strain variations when it comes to lab tests, where we are behind Europe which tests for three Lyme strains instead of one? Add tests for common co-infections? Have insurance companies cover expanded treatments when needed for health instead of deny them? It is important to treat Lyme and co-infections in their different lifecycle phases, to cover complementary and supportive therapies that boost the immune system, and to recognize that not all patients respond equally well to standard treatments once infections have been established.

  In addition to learning what it takes to heal ourselves and treat others as patients or physicians, we need to reboot health systems, agencies, insurers and providers to work for us - for our health, instead of against us, lagging far behind – especially on the hidden health challenges of our time.

  Laura Henze Russell is the principal of Precision Research and Communications, and Hidden River Health Challenge. Email her at laurarussell2@comcast.net.