[Plantagenet]

You live in Michigan, don't you AD? You got some serious Lyme disease risk zones near you.....take care and get well soon


...Lyme Disease stage 3: cognitive impairment, weakness in the legs, awkward gait, facial palsy, bladder problems, vertigo, and back pain. In rare cases untreated Lyme disease may cause frank psychosis, which has been mis-diagnosed as schizophrenia or bipolar disorder. Panic attack and anxiety can occur, also delusional behavior, including somatoform delusions, sometimes accompanied by a depersonalization or derealization syndrome, where the person begins to feel detached from themselves or from reality......

[smallpoxgirl]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('EnergyUnlimited', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('smallpoxgirl', 'I') got it back in 2002. Fortunately I found it when it was still just the rash, so three days of antibiotics and I was good. A lot of people don't notice the rash. Once you get to the secondary stage it can be a real bear to get rid of.

[SeaGypsy]

Being a hard core Australian bushy I have had so many paralysis tick bites that I am immune to lyme's.
One time a girl asked me to sentry near her bush hut whilst she invited a man for the night; I woke up with over 70 ticks embedded in my throat and chest. I pulled them out and suffered no more than I would have from a mosquito bite.
The 1st time it hits you is the only time it is likely to kill you. Ive watched plenty of cats dragging thier back legs around for days then recovering never to have a serious problem again from lyme's.
Main thing is if you are in an infected spot, check and pull any ticks before going to sleep as lyme's can knock you for 6 overnight.

[InverseBetaDecay]

Greetings fellow peaksters, I'll stop lurking & pipe up here-
My wife just got Lyme Disease 2 weeks ago. She had a strange looking bug bite, but it was a small red circle (>1.5") so we didn't panic. All the web site images were showing a big (4" or more) "bull's eye" rash. The bite mark started to fade so we thought it was just another deer fly bite, or something.

Two days later I was going to leave for work, and she said she felt really bad. She had a very low fever, so I was going to go to work anyway. As I was leaving, she starts vomiting a strange foam and she passed out briefly (twice). Finally I got concerned and made an emergency appointment with our PCP*. I was about to call 911, but that is not something a working American does without a lot of thought -($). By then the rash had grown to a big, but very faint 3" rash. The bulls eye shape was very subtle and kind of backward, dark where light should be, etc.

What I hope people get from this story is that the symptoms can vary greatly. We were lucky, my wife's case was a little unusual, but the symptoms came fast and couldn't be ignored. 21 days of Doxycycline and she should be unscathed. I did a little reading about this disease because it hit home recently, you don't want to risk neurological damage-

One last piece of info, my wife rarely goes off into areas more wild than someone's lawn. You can be bitten anywhere. (especially in CT, we invented the disease and named several towns after it


*primary care physician

[wisconsin_cur]

Bush savy Aussie,

Are you sure it is the same thing? There could be some other data out there but this seems inconclusive.

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('', 'T')here are some major differences between Australia and the endemic areas of the northern hemisphere with respect to the natural history of LD:

No ticks of the I. persulcatus complex, the principal vectors to humans in the northern hemisphere, occur in Australia. In eastern Australia, the logical candidate vector would be I. holocyclus which has a wide host range and is the most common tick biting humans. It was unable to transmit a North American strain of B.burgdorferi but an association with a so far undiscovered Australian spirochaete can not be excluded.

None of the mammal species identified as reservoir hosts in the northern hemisphere are present in Australia. There are reports of spirochaetes in Australian native animals, and a local mammal could be a reservoir host for an indigenous spirochaete that occasionally infects humans through a tick vector and produces a clinical syndrome similar to LD; however, no spirochaete was detected in the 12,000 ticks or animals processed.


Summary

The diagnosis of LD outside known endemic areas cannot be based solely on serological tests especially if they fail to conform with internationally accepted criteria, because of the high incidence of false positive results.

A clinical diagnosis in a non-endemic disease area (especially of Stage II or III disease), is difficult to support without isolation of the causative agent from the patient, from other patients with similar illness or from a known vector in the region.

The existence of LD in Australia will remain controversial until an organism is isolated from a local patient and fully characterised, or until a tick-borne organism can be shown to be responsible for the human infection. If it exists it shares few of the epidemiological or clinical characteristics of US or European patterns of LD.

[midnight-gamer]

A friend of mine has lyme. The disease turned his brain into swiss cheese, completely messing up his long and short term memory. He recovered after a 10 year fight. I'm not sure if it's something you can ever really get over completely.

[EnergyUnlimited]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('InverseBetaDecay', ' ')Finally I got concerned and made an emergency appointment with our PCP*.

*primary care physician

[vision-master]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vision-master', 'G')etting doxycycline tomorrow 10:00 am. Weekends are a bitch!

Seeing my Doc on Tues.

I'm gonna find out how much he will support me on this.

[Grautr]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vision-master', 'D')oc called yesterday. I was tested positive.

Though I was getting RA as it runs in the family.

I've have had this for at least a year. I remember the tiny litle thing.

Never got the red bulls eye?

VM medical forum.....................

[vision-master]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vision-master', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('pstarr', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('vision-master', 'G')etting doxycycline tomorrow 10:00 am. Weekends are a bitch!

Seeing my Doc on Tues.

I'm gonna find out how much he will support me on this.

[hardtootell-2]

On your own land at least some "organic" control is possible

http://www.guineafowl.com/fritsfarm/gui ... kstudy.pdf

Probably other fowl are somewhat effective also

[vision-master]

Thanks for the links....

[frankthetank]

IF you don't like your doctor/hospital head down to La Crosse to Gunderson Lutheran Hospital. They have been researching Lyme disease for a long time and i know at one time they were working on a vaccine. Not sure what kind of yahoos your dealing with up in the Twin Cities

http://www.gundluth.org/

I really can't believe i've never had it. For all the times ive been in the woods. Maybe i stink too much or something. I did have poison ivy down by my johnson once when i was younger///

edit;

Why is it so prevalent in the upper midwest? That map looks strange. Yet south of here its not as prevalent.

I'm scared to go in the woods now! Can you get it in the winter? Probably not...that is when i'll go in the woods.

[vision-master]

I gonna ask my Doc tomorrow about this.