Lyme Disease: Under-diagnosed, Debilitating and on Salt Spring Island

I started to see patients with mystery illnesses and debility who had been suffering for years or even decades. One was so weak they had to be carried to the washroom, another had terrible digestion and brain fog, and yet another with severe pain and a recurrent blistering rash the doctors had mislabelled “chronic shingles”. These symptoms pointed toward Lyme disease. With treatment they all improved. Some very dramatically.

What is Lyme Disease?

Lyme disease starts as an acute infection with a bacteria named Borrelia burgdorferi. Initial symptoms are flu-like symptoms, fatigue, headaches, joint pains and a characteristic bullseye rash. However, symptoms can be vague and the rash occurs only in 20-30% of those infected. These symptoms may occur within days to weeks of the tick bite. If not treated effectively, Lyme disease becomes a chronic infection.

Now we understand that Lyme disease also comes with several other co-infectors, such as babesia, bartonella, and erhlichia. Borrelia and its little friends do what bacteria do best: mutate and adapt. Good for their survival, but miserable for us. This makes lab diagnosis even more difficult.

Borrelia are spirochetes: corkscrew-shaped bacteria that like to burrow into things. Notably they burrow into joint and brain tissues. The only other spirochete to infect humans causes syphilis. Syphilis if left untreated progresses into neurosyphilis, meaning it infects the brain. Lyme disease if left untreated also progresses, and can get into the nervous system very rapidly in some cases.

Current conventional standards of care are inadequate. I have seen one patient who exhibited the characteristic bullseye rash of an acute Lyme infection given only 3 days of antibiotics, and another patient given 7 days. Even in conservative medical literature, antibiotic treatment is recommended at 14 days. More progressive research shows that 21-28 days gives the best results for stopping this nasty infection in its tracks. Furthermore, there are numerous natural supports, such as herbs, minerals, and high-dose probiotics to support the immune system in fighting this infection.

Treatment for Lyme Disease: My Approach

Treatment varies greatly from patient to patient, depending on the duration and severity of their infection. Typically I use a combination of long-term prescription and herbal antibiotics combined with immune boosting herbs and supplements. There are also many natural supports to help reduce the pain, inflammation, toxicity and the many imbalances that a Chronic Lyme Disease (CLD) infection can cause.

In 2014, Naturopathic Doctors with their prescriptive rights were granted access to intravenous (IV) antibiotics solely for the use in treating Lyme disease. This allowance speaks to the major need for proper, progressive care of CLD patients.

We're safe from Lyme Disease on Salt Spring, right?

Wrong. I have confirmed one case of Lyme disease on Salt Spring myself, treated another patient who was previously diagnosed and know of two other people who were infected on-island.