Lyme Science Blog

TMJ arthritis triggered by Lyme disease In the article, “Acute arthritis of the right temporomandibular joint due to Lyme disease: a case report and literature review,” the authors describe a 25-year-old patient who presented to a medical center with acute pain in the right temporomandibular joint and mouth opening disorders.¹ Over a 5-year period, the […]

Can you get ticks from pets? Yes, and according to a study by Jones et al. owning indoor-outdoor pets increases your risk of being bitten by a tick and potentially exposing yourself to various tick-borne diseases. [1] Out of the 1,546 homes with pets, 88.1% used some form of tick control on their pets. Yet,

Dissociative amnesia in a patient with post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome Investigators describe the case of a 41-year-old patient, diagnosed with post-treatment Lyme disease syndrome (PTLDS), who, in addition to exhibiting typical PTLDS symptoms, also showed a severe retrograde episodic-autobiographical and semantic amnesia. In 2015, the patient exhibited weakness and loss of energy, psychomotor slowing, night

Single tick bite leads to 3 diseases in elderly woman The woman was an avid gardener who had a history of COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) and high blood pressure. She was admitted to the hospital with dyspnea, fatigue, and a cough productive of yellowish mucoid sputum. The patient also had significant altered mental status,

Babesia Bartonella: Neuropsychiatric Symptoms in Children Babesia bartonella co-infection is more common than previously recognized—and when it occurs in children, the symptoms can be devastating. New research using advanced testing methods found that 6 of 7 patients infected with Babesia were also co-infected with one or more Bartonella species. The cases included children with severe

Homicide, two assaults, and suicide in Lyme disease patient The article entitled “A Fatal Case of Late Stage Lyme Borreliosis and Substance Abuse,”1 describes a patient exhibiting aggressiveness, violence, and homicidality. Like many Lyme disease patients, the man experienced a delay in diagnosis and treatment. (One study reports that subjects enrolling in a trial of

Chronic Lyme patient treated successfully with low dose Flagyl A 55-year-old man developed numbness and burning in his legs, numbness in his hands, tinnitus, extreme weakness, intense pain, cramps at night and at rest, palpitations, paresthesias (pins and needles sensation), headaches, shortness of breath and orthostatic hypotension. In addition, “Fatigue was intense and incapacitating, accompanied

Facial paralysis due to Lyme disease initially attributed to a virus The patient was admitted to the emergency department for acute back pain that had been progressively worsening over an 8-week period. The pain began 5 weeks after a minor surfing accident. Repeated X-rays and additional tests were normal. “The intensity of the pain is

Lyme disease associated with kidney problems Case #1 A 57-year-old woman presented to the hospital with shortness of breath. Two weeks earlier, she experienced nausea, fatigue, headache and myalgias, before developing dyspnea on moderate exertion, the authors state. She also reportedly had a rash on her shoulder. She was diagnosed with Lyme disease and initially

Lyme endocarditis diagnosed by PCR testing 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