Lyme Science Blog

by Daniel J. Cameron, MD MPH The cut-offs for fatigue and pain were chosen to reflect clinically significant levels of that symptom based on the literature. A cut-off of 36 or greater was chosen for the Fatigue Severity Score (FSS) to indicate “high fatigue symptoms.” A score of greater than 3 was chosen for the […]

by Daniel J. Cameron, MD MPH In the article, published in the journal Clinical Infectious Diseases, Pavletic, from the National Institute of Mental Health, reports “two cases of false positive Epstein-Barr virus (EBV) serologies in early-disseminated Lyme disease.” In the first case, a 16-year-old male from Virginia developed fatigue, myalgias and three brief episodes of

The woman presented with asthenia, weakness, and diffuse paresthesias. The electromyography assessment showed mild demyelination. Lyme disease was ruled out based on negative serum and cerebrospinal fluid serologic tests. Intravenous immunoglobulin treatment was performed 8 times for CIDP with subsequent partial response and relapse. Chronic inflammatory demyelinating polyneuropathy is a neurological disorder in which there

by Daniel J. Cameron, MD MPH In the British Journal of General Practice, Cooper and colleagues discuss their results which are based on hospital episode statistics (HES) data in England from the Health and Social Care Information Centre. [1] The geographic location was based on the patient’s postcode. Patients may have been admitted more than

by Daniel J. Cameron, MD MPH One month prior to being evaluated, the man had removed a tick from his outdoor cat. His laboratory tests were positive on both a Lyme enzyme-linked immunosorbent assay screening and confirmatory Western blot with 3 IgM bands: p41, p39, and p23. His electrocardiography revealed new second-degree Mobitz type I

“As far as we are aware, we are writing the first report of Plasmodium spp. and Borrelia burgdorferi co‐infection (a co‐infection of a tropical parasite and a non-tropical bacterium),” explains Neves from the Infectious Diseases Department, Centro Hospitalar São João, Portugal. The man had returned to Portugal from Angola, where he worked as a welder.

by Daniel J. Cameron, MD MPH More than 10,359 tick bite encounters were documented in 25 acute care hospitals in New Hampshire between 2010 and 2014. Twenty-five of the 26 acute care hospitals participated. According to Daly from the Bureau of Infectious Disease Control, New Hampshire Department of Health and Human Services, “6% and 22%

by Daniel J. Cameron, MD MPH The article describes a 55-year-old patient with a 2-month history of chronic neck pain with progressive marked asthenia. “Clinical examination revealed a dysarthria which disappeared in less than 1 hour, a left upper limb cerebellar ataxia and a bilateral asymmetric mild akineto-hypertonic parkinsonism,” according to Pische´ from the Department

“This study demonstrates that image-based tick identification may be an accurate and useful method of detecting ticks for surveillance when images are of suitable quality,” explains Koffi from the Centre for Foodborne Environmental and Zoonotics Infectious Diseases, Public Health Agency of Canada. Forty-one veterinary clinics located throughout regions of Quebec submitted digital images of ticks

“A previously healthy Caucasian 22-year-old male presented to a southern Quebec community hospital with syncopal episodes for one week,” according to Samuel De l’Étoile-Morel from the Department of Internal Medicine, McGill University Health Centre. “He was found to be hypotensive and bradycardic (heart rate 36 beats per minute), due to 3rd degree atrio-ventricular (AV) block,