Life After Lyme Disease

There are a number of natural supplements available that can be used to treat Lyme disease.  Many of these work by supporting the immune system and helping your body to heal itself. For example amino acid supplements (containing creatine) have been shown to ease joint and muscle pain caused by chronic Lyme disease.  Omega-3 essential fatty acids (EFAs) have also been found to ease fatigue and neurological problems associated with this infectious condition.

Ginseng

Ginseng is mostly used in the west as an energy boosting supplement, but in reality it is a very complex natural substance that can have a number of beneficial effects on the body.  Ginseng is the most versatile herb in Traditional Chinese Medicine and there are several varieties including Panax ginseng (which is the Chinese version) and Siberian ginseng (Eleutherococcus senticosus).

Ginseng root supplement

Ginseng is what is known as an adaptogen.  This means that once it is in the body it will adapt in a number of different ways depending on the conditions.  This is why ginseng is so versatile as it can help to treat a very wide range of symptoms from depression through to hormone imbalances. 

Side Effects

Ginseng is a powerful herb and its main strength lies in its ability to stimulate the body’s own natural systems.  This does mean that if you take too much ginseng you could over stimulate your body and cause side effects such as palpations, sweating, nausea and headaches. These should disappear once you stop taking ginseng but if they persist you could have an underlying condition that needs to be checked out by a healthcare advisor.

Ginseng and Lyme Disease

Lyme disease is a widespread infection which can cause a number of different symptoms including fatigue, headaches and joint pain.  If left untreated this infection can spread into the vital organs and cause a number of serious symptoms including impaired mental function and problems with the central nervous system.  Ginseng can be used in conjunction with other treatments to help defend the body against this widespread infection.  Ginseng has the ability to support brain health and improve mental function.  It also provides a boost to energy and stamina and this can help to combat the fatigue often linked with Lyme disease.  One of the main ways in which ginseng can help to fight Lyme disease is by boosting the immune system.  This can help the body to fight the infection naturally and this has been shown to help sufferers to eradicate this infection for good. 

Ginseng can also help to boost overall health by supporting the liver, thyroid and adrenal glands and ensuring the healthy, natural balance of blood pressure, blood sugar levels and hormones.

Taking Ginseng

Ginseng is widely available and is typically taken in capsule or liquid form of around 250 to 500mg per day.  You can also buy ginseng root fresh or dried from some specialist suppliers.  To use this root steep ½ teaspoon in a cup of hot water and drink as a refreshing tea once or twice a day.  Try to avoid taking too much ginseng as this is a stimulating herb and can cause diarrhoea, indigestion and headaches if taking in large quantities.

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.

Vitamin C is one of the most commonly used supplements in the world and many people regularly take oral vitamin C pills to boost overall health and ward off viruses and bacterial infections. There is a wealth of medical evidence available which has documented the ability of vitamin C to cure a number of infectious diseases, including Lyme disease.

Medical experts are very interested in the powerful healing effects of vitamin C and many believe this supplement could be one of the most effective weapons we have against viral syndromes, even those that can be incurable with modern medicines.

Why is vitamin C not prescribed for Lyme disease?

Despite the potential for vitamin C to help Lyme disease sufferers some clinical failures have been recorded which have prevented medical authorities from considering this supplement in mainstream healthcare. However after reviewing the huge volume of medical evidence relating to vitamin C several leading experts concluded that there were some clear reasons for the clinical failures of vitamin C and that they appeared to occur only when ‘a large enough amount of vitamin C cannot be effectively delivered to the invading microorganisms.’ (Stone, 1972; Smith, 1988, Levy, 2002).

These conclusions where based on the necessity of delivering vitamin C in very high dosages directly to the main sight of the infection. Oral supplements were simply not effective enough at delivering the right quantities of vitamin C into the site of infection to combat the high concentrations of invading microorganism.

Tests on the clinical effectiveness of vitamin C showed that the majority of clinical failures resulted because of inadequate delivery methods (Casciari et al. 2001). Even administrating high dosages of vitamin C (as much as 60,000mg) using intravenous injections was not always successful This means that in order for vitamin C to be recommended as a standard treatment for infectious conditions such as Lyme disease the method of delivery has to be improved.

New techniques for vitamin C treatment

New techniques for delivering vitamin C have been developed and at the Colorado Integrative Medical Center (www.coloradomedicalcenter.com) medical staff have begun using a new form of vitamin C therapy. This is known as Pulsed Intravenous Vitamin C (PIVC) therapy and offers the ability to administrator a very rapid and intensive delivery of vitamin C to the body. PIVC works by getting blood levels of vitamin C as high as possible by administrating rapid dosages in order to deliver the maximum healing power to the site of infection. This method has been shown to be safe and effective at treating a number of different conditions.

The rapid administration of high levels of vitamin C can also induce side effects such as acute hypoglycemia. This can boost healing as acute hypoglycemia is well documented at assisting the absorption of drugs into specific areas of the body and this is known as Insulin Potentiation Therapy (www.iptq.org). This is essential for vitamin C treatment because glucose can compete with vitamin C for transport around the body. By lowering the glucose levels in the blood you can ensure that higher dosages of vitamin C are transported to the site of infection.

The future of vitamin C therapy for treatment of conditions such as Lyme disease is uncertain, but the positive results being documented from new techniques such as PIVC will go a long way to convincing health authorities that this can be a safe and effective treatment for infection conditions.

Supplements can be used to support healing and promote normal function in the body. Researchers have been extensively testing key supplements such as vitamin C and D in recent years to try and understand in what ways these natural healthcare options can affect our bodies and how they can be used to boost healing. The results of these findings have played an important part of formulating new treatment plans for chronic and difficult to manage conditions such as Lyme disease and other persistent bacterial infections.

Vitamin C

Vitamin C has been shown to help support natural health in the body and dosages of around 1000mg/day can help to ward off bacterial infections such as the common cold. Extensive research has been carried out on this supplement to identify the exact healing affects it can have on the body and scientists have discovered some very interesting results. For example a recent clinical trial showed that when a dosage of 120,000mg/day was delivered intravenously it accelerated the healing of burned skin dramatically.

Vitamin C Tablets

In terms of treating conditions such as Lyme disease results from several key trials have indicated that combining vitamin C with antibiotics can show some considerable benefits. Antibiotics are recommended for Lyme disease sufferers to help eradicate the infection of the persistent bacteria (Borrelia burgdorferi) which causes the condition. In one set of controlled trials carried out on dairy cows results showed that vitamin C had synergistic effects when combined with antibiotic treatments. These trials were carried out on cows with infected udders and one group was treated just with antibiotics, the other group with a combined treatment of antibiotics and an equivalent dosage of 10,000mg/day of vitamin C (injected). Results showed that the second group with the additional vitamin C treatment recovered much more quickly from the infection, in as much as half the time as those cows receiving just the antibiotic treatment.

Vitamin D

There have been a number of other trials that have revealed that supplements can have synergistic effects when combined with antibiotics.
Vitamin D for example has been shown to be an important vitamin in the body for regulating the immune system result. A lack of vitamin D can result in slow immune responses and difficulty recovering from persistent infections even when receiving antibiotic treatments. One time dosages of 5,000 IU of vitamin D have been shown to be effective at treating the onset of serious bacterial infections such as Lyme disease. Experts recommend that patients receiving high levels of vitamin D are tested regularly to ensure levels remain safe.

Managing Lyme Disease with Supplements and Antibiotics

Results from studies around the world have shown that physicians managing Lyme disease and other persistent bacterial infections can maximize healing and recovery by combining supplements with antibiotics. A number of supplements have been found to be effective at supporting healing during treatment for Lyme disease including olive leaf extract, cats claw and niacin, which can reduce inflammation and has been shown to support healing in the brain. Vitamin C is also a key supplement for treating infections and can be taken in oral supplements of between 2,000 and 10,000mg/day.

For serious Lyme disease infections physicians can use injections to deliver much high level doses of vitamin C, niacin and vitamin D directly to infected sites. These supplements when combined with antibiotics have been shown to accelerate healing and help patients to recover from persistent bacterial infections.

References: ‘Antibiotics and Vitamins Work Together‘  – Orthomolecular Medicine News Service(www.orthomolecular.org)

Parker Posey is questioning conventional medicine after the pills she was prescribed failed to cure her of Lyme disease.

The Best In Show star was forced to pull out of an off-Broadway play earlier this year (2009) to focus on battling her tick-borne illness.

Doctors had put Posey on a course of antibiotics but after that treatment failed to restore her health, she decided to try a holistic approach and treat her Lyme disease with supplements and a complete change in her diet. She felt so much better after her holistic treatment that she decided to lend her backing to a new documentary, Rethinking Cancer, about patients who seek out alternative methods of treatment.

She says, “As someone who dealt with Lyme disease recently, I had the opportunity to approach it both with conventional medicine (antibiotics) and homoeopathic remedies and supplements. The first round of antibiotics did not destroy all the bacteria and I made a decision not to take them anymore and instead approach it purely holistically – through the help of my homoeopathic doctor, who guided me with my diet and gave me the natural supplements to bring my body back to its vitality.
“It raises the questions: How can a natural approach to healing oneself be considered so unconventional? Why do we think we can’t play an active role in getting healthy? Why do we give ourselves away so easily to pharmaceuticals that deplete our system and confuse the natural healing process?”