Life After Lyme Disease

Homeopathy Supplements

Homeopathy can be used to treat a wide range of chronic conditions.  This holistic treatment has been shown to have positive effects on widespread infections including Lyme disease.

The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has warned that Lyme disease is the fastest growing vector-borne disease in North America.  The majority of Lyme disease cases are located in just 12 high risk areas which include Connecticut, New York, Pennsylvania and Maine.  The only state that has not seen any reports of Lyme disease in North America is Montana.

Homeopathic Diagnosis

Homeopathic practitioners endeavor to create a full picture of a patient’s health.  This will encompass diet, lifestyle and general feelings of well being.  Both conventional and holistic healthcare advisors face a number of difficulties when diagnosing Lyme disease.  The symptoms can be vague and in many cases patients do not realize they may have been exposed to the ticks that carry the Lyme infection.  There are also no reliable scientific testing procedures in place for confirming Lyme disease. This can lead to many cases of incorrect diagnosis, both in terms of over and under diagnosis of Lyme disease.

The main benefit of the homeopathic treatment process is that it does not rely on the confirming the presence of Lyme disease absolutely.  Instead this method presents an initial diagnosis and then records how the condition has manifested in the individual patient.   By charting the history of illness the homeopathic practitioner can understand how the disease is affecting the body and how to tackle the symptoms appropriately.  Conventional medicine recommends only one treatment scheme (a short term course of antibiotics) to treat all Lyme patient sufferers, regardless of symptoms.  Homeopathic treatments however are highly personalized and can show some positive effects within just a few days.

Treatment

Unlike the conventional medical community Homeopathic practitioners remain united over the treatment of Lyme disease.  This unified front shows an inspiring faith in the healing system which cannot fail to impress patients. Once the individual manifestation of the condition has been identified then the practitioner will rely on accepted treatment methods to manage symptoms and work towards a cure.  Many of these treatments will work to support and boost the immune system and strengthen the patients own natural defenses against the Lyme infection.  Conventional medical experts are also beginning to see the benefits of assisting the immune system to fight widespread infections naturally.  Each homeopathic treatment will be slightly different but typically treatments used to combat this condition including Sepia, Sulphur, Tellurium, Syphilynum, Ledum, Carcinocin, Arnica, Rhus Tx, Arsenicum, Apis, Hypericum, Ruta and Silica.  There are also a wide number of other homeopathic treatments that can be used with success against Lyme disease.

Hypericum can be used to treat Lyme Disease

As well as homeopathic supplement treatments homeopathic practitioners can recommend a number of other treatments to work on overall health and well being.  These can include herbal supplements, diet, heat therapies (raising the body temperature to inhibit bacterial growth) and stress reduction techniques.

Homeopathic treatments work on overall health and well being.  They tackle not just the condition itself but also any weaknesses in the body’s system that could be contributing to ill health.  Many Lyme disease patients have responded well to homeopathic treatments and this could be worth investigating if you are not happy with conventional treatments.

Lyme disease is one of the fastest spreading conditions in North America and scientists are constantly working on new treatments and detection procedures.  One of the main problems surrounding Lyme disease it that it can be difficult to detect with the current blood test procedure recommended by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  This is because the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria that causes the condition can take weeks or even months to develop to a visible level. 

Blood testing

Early detection of Lyme disease is key in the successful treatment of this condition, so scientists are keen to implement a more effective test procedure. Lyme disease is transmitted to humans and animals by the bites of infected blacklegged ticks.  This disease can cause a number of symptoms from fatigue and nausea through to more serious rheumatological, neurological and cardiac complications.

Lyme Symptoms

Lyme disease can be difficult to diagnose on testing alone so it is important that both patients and doctors understand symptoms.  If you have been exposed to ticks and start to feel unwell you should visit your healthcare advisor as soon as possible.  Symptoms can include feelings of tiredness, nausea, muscle weakness and constant headaches.  You should also look out for the characteristic ‘bulls eye’ rash which often appears in conjunction with Lyme disease.  This rash can appear anywhere between three days to four weeks after the initial infection.  Commonly the rash manifests initially around the original infection site.  Lyme disease can remain dormant in the body for some time before any symptoms start to show.  This means that the patient may not remember having been exposed to ticks.  This is why it is so important that healthcare advisors have access to an accurate method of testing to identify this disease for treatment.

Luciferase Immunoprecipitation System (LIPS)

The luciferase immunoprecipitation system (LIPS) test has been around for a few years now and has been used to detect a number of viral and fungal pathogens that can affect the body.  Researchers at the National Institutes of Health have recently announced successful results in the using the LIPS test for Lyme disease.  These results were reported in the recent June 2010 edition of the respected journal ‘Clinical and Vaccine Immunology’. 

In the latest research from the National Institutes of Health the LIPS test was evaluated for its effective at detecting antibody responses to Lyme bacteria.  Blood tests were taken from infected patients and also those that had not been exposed to Lyme disease.  Researchers found that 98 to 100% of patients were correctly diagnosed as having Lyme disease through using the LIPS test in combination with the synthetic protein VOVO.  The report suggested that :

‘…screening by the LIPS test with VOVO and other B. burgdorferi antigens offers an efficient quantitative approach for evaluation of the antibody responses in patients with Lyme disease.’

These results are very impressive and the rollout of screening for Lyme disease through LIPS test with VOVO could offer an effective way to diagnose Lyme Disease quickly and effectively in the future.

Prevention is better than the cure when it comes to Lyme disease, as this prevalent tick-borne condition can be difficult to diagnose and treat and can lead to some unpleasant and potentially harmful long term symptoms.

Experts have identified a number of strategies that have been shown to reduce tick abundance and therefore help to reduce the spread of Lyme disease, but there are currently no state-wide measures in place to deal with this growing problem.

Deer Population Control

Reducing the numbers of deer populations in high risk Lyme disease zones is a controversial strategy, but in many areas these animals are seen as one of the prime carriers of the infected ticks. This has been shown to be a potentially effective strategy as can be seen by examples such as Monhegan Island, Maine.  Here the populations of white tailed deer were totally eliminated during 1999 and 2000, and by 2004 no blacklegged ticks were found at all on the rodents on the island.  However it has not been shown conclusively that these techniques can have a significant effect on reducing the numbers of infected ticks in non-isolated areas such as mainland USA.

White Tailed Deer

Host-Target Methods

A more humane and potentially more effective method is currently being trialed, and this is called host-targeting.  This involves setting up deer feeding stations that are equipped with applicators that dispense pesticides, and also baited devices that can kill ticks feeding on rodents such as rats, mice and shrews, which are also prime carriers of infected ticks.  Host-targeted methods have performed well in testing, and initial trials have shown that the using pesticide treatments at deer feeding stations reduced populations of the known carriers of Lyme disease, the blacklegged tick ((Ixodes scapularis), by as much as 69%.  Rodent baited pesticide devices also showed well in the trials, and were also effective at reducing populations of blacklegged ticks.

Pesticides

Pesticides, in particular acaricides (targeted at the Acari group which includes mites and ticks), have been used effectively to suppress tick populations in residential areas.  This works well in combination with efforts to remove brush, dense landscaping, leaf litter and woodpiles around domestic dwellings, and in general open up areas to reduce habitats for both ticks and the prey they feed on such as deer and rodents.  The pesticides cyfluthrin, deltamethrin and carbaryl have been shown to be particularly effective at killing the nymph stage of the blacklegged ticks (Ixodes scapularis), but homeowners are not always willing to use pesticides heavily around their own properties.  There are also some concerns that pesticides could be overused and this could affect fragile ecosystems.

Landscape Management

Landscape management practices can also be used to reduce tick abundance, and strategic one year intervals of controlled wild grassland and brush burning were found to reduce the populations of tick adults and larvae significantly.  Burnings scheduled for the spring time were found to be particularly effective.

There is no way of completely eliminating the presence of ticks in wild and residential environments, but there are a number of strategies available that could help to significantly reduce tick abundance, and help to in turn reduce the risks of Lyme disease being passed to humans and domestic animals.

Genetic engineering has always been a controversial issue, but researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Fort Collins, Colorado have been testing ways in which advanced genetic engineering techniques could help to prevent the spread of the potentially debilitating insect-borne condition known as Lyme disease.

Microscopic image of tick

Lyme disease is transmitted by the bite of infected blacklegged ticks and is a major problem throughout many parts of Europe and the mid and eastern United States, and has recently been shown to be spreading across the border into southern Canada. Lyme disease is difficult to detect in the early stages as the symptoms are often generalized and similar to a number of other common conditions, and although this disease can be cleared up quickly with a course of oral or injected antibiotics, if left untreated it can become very serious, resulting in a number of painful and potentially debilitating symptoms including Lyme arthritis and heart problems.

New Research

Researchers in the Vector-Borne Infectious Diseases team at Fort Collins have been analyzing exactly how the bacteria responsible for Lyme disease, Borrelia burgdorferi, is transmitted and have been testing ways in which genetic engineering could interfere with this process and halt the spread of this disease. Recent laboratory research into genetic engineering and insect-borne diseases has revealed some breakthrough results, which could hold the key to developing an effective vaccine against the potentially debilitating disease caused by Borrelia burgdorferi infections.

Deactivating Genes

Genetic engineering has allowed researchers to analyze Lyme disease on a genetic level, and research has shown that deactivating specific genes in the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria makes it much less likely for hosts to contract Lyme disease. The gene isolated for this treatment is known as bba64, and is expressed by those ticks responsible for the spread of Lyme disease, and scientists believe this gene plays a key part in the infection process, facilitating the transmission of the bacteria from tick bites to the animal host by somehow repressing the host’s immune response and allowing the bacteria to pass unchallenged into the system. Researchers deactivated gene bba64 and then used this to inoculate mice test subjects in a laboratory environment, and found that when the mice were exposed to infected ticks they were much less likely to become infected with the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria compared to those mice that had not been inoculated.

Close up image of tick mouth parts

Researchers believe that by deactivating the bba64 gene which naturally facilitates the infection process, they can effectively create a laboratory stage vaccination and it is thought this works by making it much more difficult for the Lyme disease bacteria to survive in the tick’s mouth and gut, meaning that there are not enough bacteria to pass along in the ticks saliva when it feeds in order to infect the host animal.

Future Vaccination

Although this genetic testing is only in its early stages scientists are hopeful that this breakthrough research on the bba64 gene may hold the key to developing an effective Lyme disease vaccination for the future, and may also be useful in developing vaccinations for other insect-borne diseases.

Insects that feed on animals are primary carriers of a number of unpleasant diseases, and many of these can be transmitted from animals to humans such as Lyme disease, which is caused by the bacteria Borrelia burgdorferi.

Humans have a significant impact on fragile ecosystems all around the world, and research suggests that increasing urbanization and modern forest management techniques can all have a significant impact on the spread of tick-borne disease.  We often think of dramatic environmental disruptions happening in far away places such as the rainforests or Arctic glaciers, but similar problems are occurring with ecosystems right in our own backyards, and this can result in a number of problems such as an increased risk of exposure to infected ticks carrying the bacteria which causes Lyme disease.

Urbanization spreading into wild areas

Urbanization

Ticks mostly feed on woodland mammals such as mice, rabbits and deer, and because their chosen prey is more abundant at woodland and forest edges this is also where the population densities of ticks are the most concentrated.  Spreading urbanization has put woodland and forests under threat and pushed the boundaries between residential and wild areas even closer, and this means that there are more and more people living and working in high risk areas for Lyme disease.

Forest Management

Both ticks and their prey need certain habitats in order to survive, and researchers at the Washington University’s Tyson Research Center discovered that in the Missouri Ozarks (predominantly oak and other hardwood forests) those areas which were managed by the Missouri Department of Conservation and the Nature Conservancy were actually more at risk from tick-borne diseases crossing to humans and domestic animals, as selective logging and managed burns of the woodland created much more sustainable habitats for the prey ticks fed from, in particular deer and small mammals such as rabbits which both prefer the tender fresh green growth that is abundant in newly cleared woodland areas.

Woodland management can create ideal habitats for ticks

Researchers were keen to determine exactly which species were the main feeders of infected ticks in a typical woodland enviroment, and so collected ticks from a variety of sites in the managed woodland and wilder areas, and analyzed the DNA in the blood the ticks had fed on to identify which animal the blood came from, and whether or not any pathogenic bacteria were present.  This research provided some interesting results and it was found that stable deer populations did not significantly effect the spread of tick-borne diseases, but that concentrated populations brought about by plentiful food and protected habitats caused a dramatic increase in the impact and spread of tick-borne diseases such as Lyme disease.

The Importance of Tracking Emerging Diseases

With Lyme disease and other insect-borne diseases it is important we fully understand under what conditions the carriers of these pathogens can multiply and spread, as this will help health authorities and governments to identify and track emerging patterns of these potentially harmful diseases and put measures in place quickly to minimize the impact on humans.  For example the research from the Ozarks showed that managed environments caused explosions in deer populations, which in turn led to the increased risk of Lyme disease passing to humans and other animals, and this could be a significant piece of evidence to drive measures against the spread of ticks in the future, particularly when you consider that some state agencies actually encourage deer populations by planting out food for them.  In Missouri alone it was estimated that there were over 1.4 million deer, and this seems to be a similar pattern in woodland across the US, and researchers have estimated that there could be as many as 30 million deer currently living wild in the the mid and eastern United States.  It is likely that alongside these increasing deer and rabbit populations levels of other small mammals such as squirrels, shrews and mice are also booming, which can also be key prey sources for ticks, and all of this could explain why tick-borne diseases are spreading despite many efforts to hold them in check.

Lyme disease is a condition transmitted by the saliva of ticks when they feed on a host (human or animal), and is caused by the Borrelia burgdorferi bacteria.  It is thought that the Western blacklegged tick and the deer tick are the primary carriers of the Borrelia burgdorferi, and these are common throughout northern America and southern Canada, and high risk areas of infection for humans include forest and woodland edges and open grassy areas.

Diagnosing Lyme Disease

Testing for the Borrelia burgdorferi infection

Lyme disease typically manifests in the early stages as a skin rash, often with a characteristic ‘bulls eye’ inflammation pattern, which can take between 3 to 30 days to develop.  However it has been estimated that in as many as 30-50% of cases no rash will develop at all, and this can make diagnosis in the early stages very difficult.  If left untreated Lyme Disease can develop into more serious symptoms, which can include meningitis, heart problems, arthritis, nerve damage (peripheral neuropathy) and inflammation of the spinal cord and brain (encephalomyelitis).  Lyme disease can be challenging to diagnose, as many of the symptoms are common across a wide range of other conditions, and there are as yet no conclusive tests for identifying the disease in its early stages (serological testing is only useful when the disease has progressed further). Many patients with Lyme disease are not correctly diagnosed in the early stages, and this can lead to months and even years of unnecessary suffering.  Lyme disease can actually be treated very successfully with either oral or injected antibiotics if caught in the early stages, but if left untreated the condition can become very serious and then it can be much more difficult to combat the disease and its symptoms once it has turned chronic.  Many physicians are still relying on serological testing to identify the condition, but this is simply not reliable enough and has been shown to fail to detect the Borrelia burgdorferi infection in as much as 20% of clinical tests.  One of the reasons current tests are ineffective in the early stages of the condition is that it can take as much as six weeks after the initial infection for the Borrelia burgdorferi bactera in the blood to reach large enough levels to show up in testing.  Also this bacteria can sometimes lie dormant for long periods of time, and this can make a diagnosis difficult if it emerges later on, as the patient may not connect the condition with any exposure to ticks that occurred in the past.

Blood test for Lyme Disease

This is why it is so important that physicians are educated in the process of identifying and diagnosing Lyme disease in its early stages, and the key to this is not clinical tests but possessing a good epidemiological understanding about the risks of patient exposure to infected ticks.

Surveillance

Physicians also play a vital role in the surveillance of ticks and can help to identify new endemic areas quickly by being able to diagnose the disease effectively, and also by reporting all suspected and confirmed cases to the local Health Authority.  This process has helped researchers to pinpoint infected tick emergence in Canada, and has shown tick populations spreading in Ontario, Nova Scotia, Manitoba, Quebec and British Columbia. Through enhanced surveillance and increased awareness of symptoms and treatments, physician can play a crucial role in minimizing the impact of Lyme disease as it spreads to new areas.

Image of adult blacklegged tick

Lyme disease is a tick-borne infection, and is primarily spread to humans through bites from deer ticks, Western blacklegged ticks and possibly lone star ticks.  These tick species carry the Borrelia burgdorferi bacterium which causes Lyme disease, and feed on a number of small to medium size mammals and birds including small rodents, deer and household pets.

Birds

Birds play a major role in the spread of Lyme disease as they can pick up a tick carrying the Borrelia burgdorferi bacterium in one location, and because it takes a long time for ticks to feed they could be hundreds or even thousands of miles away before the tick finally drops off.  The seasonal migration of birds in Northern America is key to the spread of Lyme disease and over 650 species of bird migrate to different parts of the world annually, either taking part in long distance migration to places such as Africa, Eastern Europe and South America, or short distance migration of just a few hundred miles.  Many birds such as White-throated Sparrows and robins spend the winter in Northern America before moving on to summer feeding grounds in Canada, and there are also a number of transitory birds that pass through Canada as a stop over on the way to other feeding grounds, and many of these could potentially be carrying infected ticks or the Borrelia burgdorferi bacterium itself, which they could pass on to uninfected ticks in the areas they feed in.

The spread of ticks carrying Borrelia burgdorferi bacterium into Southern Canada

Reforestation

A number of factors can influence the spread of any insect species, but the main culprit for the spread of ticks is thought to be reforestation.  Ticks are hardy creatures, but they do require the right habitats to live in. For example the blacklegged tick thrives in cool, moist conditions and the majority can be found in forested areas with dense shrub layers to provide shade and moisture, and tend to condense along the forest and woodland edges, where food is most abundant.  They can also survive in denser underground planting in some landscaped residential areas.

In recent years many areas that were previous cleared for farmland in northern America have been reverted back to small patches of woodland and forest, creating ideal environments not just for ticks, but for the animals they feed on such as deer and small rodents.  This increase in wild tick populations would not normally be a major problem but as urbanization is also increasing, with residential developments encroaching on wild areas, more and more infected ticks are coming into contact with humans, and these woodland border areas in which ticks are prevalent are now coexisting alongside residential areas, creating high risk zones for Lyme disease crossing to humans.

Reforestation is thought to be having a significant impact on the increasing spread of Lyme disease from North America into Canada, and studies by the Public Health Agency of Canada have so far tracked new infected tick emergence in Ontario, Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, Quebec and Manitoba. 

Steps to Prevent the Spread

The Public Health Agency of Canada and other organizations are calling for national surveillance to be put in place to monitor the changing patterns of tick behavior, to identify new endemic areas quickly and effectively in order to notify the public and local health authorities and ensure education is put in place to minimize the impact of Lyme disease.  Doctors are now required to report any suspected and confirmed cases of Lyme disease to the Public Health Agency, and this enhanced surveillance combined with greater physician and public awareness are crucial steps to help mimize the impact of the disease as it spreads into Canada.

An Ixodia tick is a very small tick which is much smaller than dog or cat ticks. The juvenile deer tick is about the size of a pinhead, the biggest adult deer tick can grow to about three-sixteenths of an inch.

A Lyme disease infection can happen after a deer tick is attached to a human or other host for twelve to twenty-four hours. An infected deer tick has Borrelia that lives in the tick’s midgut. Ticks are parasites that insert their mouthparts into their hots and drink blood for several days. When an infected tick attaches itself to a host and feeds, the Borrelia enters the salivary gland and proceeds into it”s human hosts blood stream.

The tick larvae and nymphs usually become infected with Borrelia burgdorferi when they feed on infected small animals, in particular the white-footed mouse. The bacteria remain in the tick as it changes from larva to nymph or from nymph to adult. Infected nymphs and adult deer ticks then start feeding on other small rodents, other animals, and humans, and transmit the bacteria to them. Adult ticks preferentially feed on the white-tailed deer, which thereby becomes an significant source of Borrelia burgdorferi in regions of infestation. The tick’s life cycle takes two years to complete (see diagram below).

The deer tick’s life cycle is comprised of three distinguishing stages: larvae, nymphs, and adults and lasts aproxinately two years.

In the spring and summer of the first year, eggs hatch into larvae which feed once and molt into nymphs. Nymphs become dormant for the fall and winter.

In the second year, nymphs emerge to feed from May through July. At this time, the nymph may transmit bacteria to humans or to wild or domestic mammals.

In the fall, nymphs molt into adult ticks. The females feed on deer and various large mammals, mate, lay their eggs, and then die. If females don’t feed in the fall, they will try to find a large mammal host during the following spring. Male deer ticks attach to a host to wait for females, but do not take a blood meal.

Borrelia burgdorferi is the species of spirochete bacteria responsible for Lyme Disease. It is transmitted by Ixodes ticks (also known as deer ticks) and was recognized by the mid 1930s and at that time was called tick-borne meningoencephalitis.

In the United States, Lyme disease was not recognized until the early 1970s, as an outbreak of childhood arthritis took place in the Lyme, CT area. This was investigated by Allen Steere, MD, and others from Yale. The acknowledgment that the patients in the United States had ECM led to the realization that Lyme arthritis was one manifestation of the same tick-borne condition known in Europe. After Willy Burgdorfer, MD, discovered a borrelial organism in Ixodes ticks, it was found in patients with clinical Lyme disease, substantiating it as the responsible agent. This led to the development of antibody tests for the disease. Several different strains of Borrelia are recognized, which explains why the clinical manifestations of Lyme disease are varied in the United States and Europe.

Here are some pictures of Borrelia burgdorferi that I found at lymephotos.com. Take a look at their site as they have many more pictures.

Here is another great image which details the structure and morphology of Borrelia burgdorferi.