Once the Borrelia Lyme bacteria enter the blood stream of a human, it is immediately susceptible to attack.
An immediate cellular response of neutrophils and macrophage will try and digest the bacteria, and also present markers for the bacteria to lymphocytes that will over the course of several weeks begin to turn out killer T-cells and B-cells that produce specific antibodies.
The first mechanism to survive is to leave the blood stream!
Borrelia can do this by either entering the blood vessel cells called endothelial cells, or transiting the blood-vessel through gaps it creates, and entering other tissues.
If the bacteria do this quickly enough, not enough bacteria will be present to cause an immune response. In other words, it tricks the immune system into thinking that there is no active persistent infection.
If the infection load in the blood is too low, the immune response is muted. But the bacteria can persist in low numbers in other tissues.
Often the first tissues the bacteria find themselves in; is back in the skin usually at the tick-bite-site.
The cellular response to attack the bacteria that is literally swimming through the skin cells, causes the redness, and the appearance of the rash.
Over time parts of the rash fade as the immune response lessens as the bacteria move away from ground-zero.
Another place Borrelia burgdorferi can hide is in the skin. We have seen in culture that fibroblast skin cells can safely harbor the bacteria, and prevent powerful drugs like IV ceftriaxone at high concentrations to have almost no lethal effect on the sequestered bacteria.
If we can’t kill the bacteria in in-vitro skin studies, why would we think we have any better luck in a living human when there are even better places to hide?
Georgilis K, Peacocke M, and Klempner MS. Fibroblasts protect the Lyme Disease spirochete, Borrelia burgdorferi from ceftriaxone in vitro. J. Infect Dis. 1992;166:440-444
It isn’t what we don’t know about Lyme disease that is causing patients to suffer. It is what we have known and chosen to ignore that is slowly killing patients by diminishing their quality of life until they have nothing left to fight with.
Once the bacteria enter the blood stream, with every beat of the heart the bacteria are dispersed throughout the body. These motile leech-like creatures use their ability to swim and their ability to attach to cells to their advantage to survive.
The above is a short extract from Lyme on the Brain (Part 3-A)
Lecture Notes of Tom Grier
Tomgrier2001@yahoo.com
The whole article can be found on Madison area support group here
Showing posts with label skin infection. Show all posts
Showing posts with label skin infection. Show all posts
Saturday, 28 August 2010
Monday, 16 August 2010
TRAGIC DEATH CAUSED BY UNDIAGNOSED LYME BORRELIOSIS
This is a truly tragic case of a little boy with Lyme Disease whose doctors failed to diagnose him and then he died. This was not a case of Acute Lyme Disease the boy had been ill three years and so was suffering with Chronic Lyme Disease.
My heart goes out to the Linus' family and thank them for their efforts to ensure no other family will lose a child so un necessarily with a treatable illness such as Lyme Disease.
Below is a translation from the Swedish newspaper original can be found here
Top Photo caption: Linus parents, Lennart and Jeanette Wallberg, report the doctors who missed their son's illness. "We are doing everything that others will not be part of the same thing."
Boy's photo caption:Linus Wallberg fought against his illness a long time - eventually he died, aged 15, of Lyme.
Main body:For several years fought Linus Wallberg, 15, to their pain. Last spring, he died of neurological Lyme disease at home in the family's couch. Now they report three family physicians to Health and Medical Treatment.- I have no confidence in care longer. We are doing everything that others will not be part of the same thing, "says Lennart dad.Linus Wallberg had been sick more than three years.
On several occasions he had been given emergency leave to the emergency department in Nyköping with all-over body pain, severe nausea, and vomiting. But when the family rushed to the hospital were sent home again, Linus usually diagnosed with stomachflu or influenza.- "We believed in what the doctors said. Nobody wants to believe that your child is seriously ill, "said Linus' Mom Jeanette Wallberg.
Doctors dismissed the fears
One of the doctors gave Linus a diagnosis of asthma stomach [needclarification on dx] and said that his pain would disappear by itself overtime. And when Jeanette told the doctor that she was worried that she would one day find her son dead the doctor laughed and dismissed her concerns.
But Linus was seriously ill. Early on the morning of February 17 last year,when Dad would get Lennart Linus, he found him dead in the family's couch.
Autopsy report showed that Linus had died from complications of neuro-Lyme.
- To my knowledge, none of any doctors with Linus tested him for Lyme. Had they taken the spinal cord samples, and gave him antibiotics Linus, he would have lived today. But it felt like they did not take us seriously, "says Jeanette.
Important to the case investigated Linus' parents have now sent three doctors to the health care committee and Responsibility. One of them is Chief Diana Born Welff Stein, who is medical director of children's hospital in Nyköping.- It has stood in the records and they saw symptoms Linus and did not automatically suspect neurological Lyme disease, otherwise they would have investigated and dealt with Linus. But this is a very difficult diagnosis to make, "she says.
Have you failed in the treatment of Linus?- Yes of course I just had to say when a child dies from a treatable disease. I can understand that the family chooses to report and it is important that the case be investigated, "said Diana Stein Born Welff.
But it is of little comfort to Linus family.- They did not believe us. We will never get over this, but if notification helps other parents to avoid going through the same thing [so there is always something], "says Jeanette Wallberg.
Grey box:Facts - Borrelia Less than one in ten people who suffer from Lyme borreliosis may have neurotoxicity. Usually noticeable symptoms show between one to two months after the tick bite, but time may vary from just a few weeks up to six months.
Usually it begins as a skin infection, many notice no change in skin before they get symptoms from the nervous system. Neuro-borreliosis is common among children than adults.(Source: www.1177.se)
two other articles were here and here
Sadly doctors not taking patients seriously when they complain of the symptoms of Lyme Disease is all too common as the several thousand patients who subscribe to Eurolyme will testify to.
My heart goes out to the Linus' family and thank them for their efforts to ensure no other family will lose a child so un necessarily with a treatable illness such as Lyme Disease.
Below is a translation from the Swedish newspaper original can be found here
Top Photo caption: Linus parents, Lennart and Jeanette Wallberg, report the doctors who missed their son's illness. "We are doing everything that others will not be part of the same thing."
Boy's photo caption:Linus Wallberg fought against his illness a long time - eventually he died, aged 15, of Lyme.
Main body:For several years fought Linus Wallberg, 15, to their pain. Last spring, he died of neurological Lyme disease at home in the family's couch. Now they report three family physicians to Health and Medical Treatment.- I have no confidence in care longer. We are doing everything that others will not be part of the same thing, "says Lennart dad.Linus Wallberg had been sick more than three years.
On several occasions he had been given emergency leave to the emergency department in Nyköping with all-over body pain, severe nausea, and vomiting. But when the family rushed to the hospital were sent home again, Linus usually diagnosed with stomachflu or influenza.- "We believed in what the doctors said. Nobody wants to believe that your child is seriously ill, "said Linus' Mom Jeanette Wallberg.
Doctors dismissed the fears
One of the doctors gave Linus a diagnosis of asthma stomach [needclarification on dx] and said that his pain would disappear by itself overtime. And when Jeanette told the doctor that she was worried that she would one day find her son dead the doctor laughed and dismissed her concerns.
But Linus was seriously ill. Early on the morning of February 17 last year,when Dad would get Lennart Linus, he found him dead in the family's couch.
Autopsy report showed that Linus had died from complications of neuro-Lyme.
- To my knowledge, none of any doctors with Linus tested him for Lyme. Had they taken the spinal cord samples, and gave him antibiotics Linus, he would have lived today. But it felt like they did not take us seriously, "says Jeanette.
Important to the case investigated Linus' parents have now sent three doctors to the health care committee and Responsibility. One of them is Chief Diana Born Welff Stein, who is medical director of children's hospital in Nyköping.- It has stood in the records and they saw symptoms Linus and did not automatically suspect neurological Lyme disease, otherwise they would have investigated and dealt with Linus. But this is a very difficult diagnosis to make, "she says.
Have you failed in the treatment of Linus?- Yes of course I just had to say when a child dies from a treatable disease. I can understand that the family chooses to report and it is important that the case be investigated, "said Diana Stein Born Welff.
But it is of little comfort to Linus family.- They did not believe us. We will never get over this, but if notification helps other parents to avoid going through the same thing [so there is always something], "says Jeanette Wallberg.
Grey box:Facts - Borrelia Less than one in ten people who suffer from Lyme borreliosis may have neurotoxicity. Usually noticeable symptoms show between one to two months after the tick bite, but time may vary from just a few weeks up to six months.
Usually it begins as a skin infection, many notice no change in skin before they get symptoms from the nervous system. Neuro-borreliosis is common among children than adults.(Source: www.1177.se)
two other articles were here and here
Sadly doctors not taking patients seriously when they complain of the symptoms of Lyme Disease is all too common as the several thousand patients who subscribe to Eurolyme will testify to.
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