Lyme Science Blog

When Stroke Symptoms Lead to Unexpected Diagnosis A 40-year-old man presented to the emergency department with a headache that had been ongoing for 5 days and intermittent numbness in his left arm. CT scan and MRI of the brain revealed acute subarachnoid hemorrhage and the patient was admitted to the neurology unit for medical management […]

Scientists from the University of Bristol studied the naturally occurring electrostatic charges in animals. They reported their findings in a study entitled “Static electricity passively attracts ticks onto hosts.”¹ “Mammals, birds, and reptiles are known to carry appreciable net electrostatic charges, equivalent to surface potentials on the order of hundreds to tens of thousands of

The 49-year old man had been diagnosed one month earlier with Lyme disease after testing positive and treated with a 10-day course of doxycycline. He was an avid hiker who had frequented trails in Pennsylvania, wrote Palmer and colleagues in their article “Atrial Flutter and Left Hemidiaphragmatic Paralysis in the Setting of Lyme Disease.”¹ The

A 14-year-old boy diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder showed substantial improvement in cognitive and neuropsychiatric symptoms following treatment for Lyme disease and Bartonella. Offutt and Breitschwerdt describe this case in a recent report: academic testing improved from special education level to tenth grade level, oppositional behavior resolved, and the patient was eventually accepted into a

The boy presented with fatigue, posterior lower neck pain, and a low-grade temperature of 100.8 for one day. There was no history of a tick bite, erythema migrans rash, or Bell’s palsy suggestive of Lyme disease. There was pain in the soft tissues of the posterior neck and upper back. An MRI of the cervical

In their article, “Ten-year-old Omani Girl with Lyme Arthritis,” Mughaizwi and colleagues describe a young child who had lived in the United States for 5 years before moving to Oman.¹ One year after her return to Oman, she developed symptoms of Lyme arthritis. “We report a 10-year-old girl who presented with acute arthritis of the

In this case report, “Exacerbation of Osteoarthritic Joint Pain by Lyme Disease,” Bennani and colleagues demonstrate the importance in identifying an underlying tick-borne infection, as appropriate treatment can dramatically improve a patient’s quality of life.¹ A 63-year-old man, who was wheelchair-bound, presented to his clinician’s office with severe pain in both knees, which had been

Lyme disease is typically associated with flu-like symptoms or neurologic complications, but infection with Borrelia burgdorferi can also cause problems with your eyes. In their article, “Co-infectious Uveitis With Syphilis and Lyme Disease: A Case Report,” Mandal and colleagues describe what they believe is the first documented case of a patient with concurrent co-infection of