This summer, a 9-year-old boy in Canada developed Powassan virus encephalitis, a life-threatening condition. In Pennsylvania, another young child was hospitalized with the virus. And, in April, an older man from Massachusetts was infected. Meanwhile, last year, a Maryland resident died from Powassan encephalitis after contracting it in Canada. Powassan virus – transmitted in 15 […]

Case Study: Unexplained Foot Pain One of my patients experienced severe foot pain, even while walking to the bathroom. A podiatrist diagnosed him with plantar fasciitis, and he tried various treatments including icing, NSAIDs, stretching, iontophoresis, shoe inserts, and cortisone injections. Despite these efforts, his foot pain persisted. In addition to foot pain, he suffered […]

By 1990, I had started prescribing intravenous ceftriaxone (Rocephin), based on emerging reports of its effectiveness in chronic neurologic Lyme disease. This adjustment was influenced by reports from doctors Dr. Logigian, Kaplan, and Steere, who documented the treatment of chronic neurologic Lyme disease cases. I added azithromycin (marked as Zithromax in the USA) and clarithromycin […]

My patient took a “bury-your-head-in-the-sand” approach towards Lyme disease, which did not help him. He had been ill for more than 2 years, suffering from severe fatigue, brain fog, poor sleep, headaches, poor concentration, irritability, neck pain, chest pain, palpitations, stomach pains, and joint pain. He remained ill despite having been evaluated by several specialists […]

When I first began treating Lyme disease in 1987, the primary antibiotic prescribed was doxycycline. This choice was driven by doxycycline’s effectiveness not only against Lyme disease itself but also against co-infections such as Ehrlichia and Anaplasmosis. These co-infections, often transmitted by the same ticks that carry Lyme, present additional challenges in patient management. However, […]

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 woman’s distal bite was treated with […]

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, […]

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 sweats, and difficulties with attention. A few months prior to […]

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, pallor, and peripheral edema. A lung examination revealed bibasilar crackles, […]

“Droplet digital PCR assays (ddPCRs) were developed and validated in our laboratory to enhance the sensitivity of detection of Babesia, Bartonella and Borrelia spp. DNA in animal and human patient specimens,” according to Maggi and colleagues from the College of Veterinary Medicine at North Carolina State University. Investigators used digital PCR assays with enhanced sensitivity […]

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 Lyme encephalopathy were ill an average of two years […]

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 by anxiety, difficulty concentrating, mental fogginess and sleep disturbances,” […]

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 greater at night and the patient sleeps little. These pains are […]

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 treated with doxycycline. Concerned that she […]

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 of acute stroke. Additional testing “redemonstrated the […]