Un-freakin' believable - Syphilis can lay dormant but Lyme can't??

[Hope75]

"If untreated, an infected person will progress to the latent (hidden) stage of syphilis. The latent stage is defined as the year after a person becomes infected. After the secondary-stage rash goes away, the person will not have any symptoms for a time (latent period). The latent period may be as brief as 1 year or range from 5 to 20 years."

Syphilis is a spirochete.  Lyme is a spirochete.  How do they think they can get by with saying that chronic Lyme does not exist?!  How can it not be an STD like syphilis?

Sorry, but I am in the anger stage of this diagnosis, apparently.

[LORR]

hello i wonder if you take a syphillis test would it be postive?? i seen treatment for doxy of 500mg for 30 days for latent syphillis wonder if you could do the same treatment??

[cindy903]

How do people with syphilis know they're cured?

[patsy10]

It makes perfect sense that if the syphilis spirochete can lie dormant, then so can the lyme spirochete.  I had a period of about 7 years of dormancy.  It all came back after having surgery.  

This controversy has been around for a long time.  I have been dealing with this for 17 years, minus the years of dormancy.  I really have not seen a whole lot of progress in this thinking since the early 90's when I had the rash.  Hopefully this thinking will change in time.

[Amyloo]

In July, the hearings for the challange to the IDSA guidelines will finally begin.  There has been a huge, huge amount of documentation and information that has been given to IDSA that contradicts just about everything they have tried to stand by, and now they are being taken to task in a hearing, to finally address why they feel the guidelines are valid.  Can't wait to see it.

I feel they will be hard pressed to justify staying with the status quo.  FYI, the hearings will be live on the internet for us to view.  You should see the three foot stack of documentation that ILADS provided to them.  This was just one of many prominant (and respected) organizations and physicians that have weighed in.  I believe the tide is changing.  

[PlateletGal]

What Prof. Nicolson had to write about the politics of chronic lyme disease :


PROF. NICOLSON's RESPONSE:  I think that the medical profession has to get away from the politics of Lyme Disease before any real progress can be made.  There has been a concerted effort in mainstream medicine to down-play the seriousness of Lyme Disease, especially chronic Lyme Disease.  One of the oldest professional societies, the Infectious Disease Society, has done a major disservice to patients with LD by down-playing chronic LD.  Basically the traditional ID societies although excellent with acute infections have traditionally left chronic infections to other specialists, such as rheumatologists.  This is finally being rectified, but it took a major lawsuit to force the society to recognize some of the approaches used by Lyme physicians and the International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS).  

http://www.medhelp.org/posts/Fibromyalgia---CFS/Q--A-Session-With-Dr-Garth-Nicholson-10-6-08/show/648144

[wonko]

If you go up against anyone in the medical profession who doesn't believe in chronic Lyme, they will over and over tell you how there is simply no evidence for it and that all of the patient testimony in the world is scientifically meaningless.  

My position is that the tests are flawed, so the lack of evidence is also meaningless.  At least clinical symptoms and patient experience give our LLMD's something to go on, if all doctors were waiting for indisputable evidence, none of us would get treatment.

It's a departure to be on this side of the fence.  I don't want to defend my illness to people, so I just don't tell them.  

Personally, I do think that Lyme can lay dormant, and I strongly suspect that is what happened in my case.  I was at very low risk for a tick bite at the onset of my obvious symptoms, and had more subtle signs for years that I ignored.

JC's right:  Go ahead and be angry.  There is way too much squabbling over the definitions and controversies over Lyme, and too little help for patients.  

[JackieCalifornia]

That's okay, BE ANGRY!  I get that way sometimes too, ... when I can dredge up the energy to do so.  :)

It's one of the great mysteries to me why this very point does not seem to affect the mainstream MDs and their thinking ... Perhaps it is because few of them have ever seen a case of tertiary syphilis, because if it's caught early, it is easily curable.

Therefore when faced with Lyme, today's MDs draw a parallel that since early syphilis can be fully cured with a short course of penicillin, then a short course of more recent antibiotics will also fully cure Lyme.  Therefore any lingering symptoms of Lyme must be phantom symptoms like an amputee still feeling pain in a missing limb.

There is a certain twisted logic to that analysis, but it may explain some of what we are up against.  Just a random thought....

Be angry; it keeps one from feeling helpless.  Depression and anxiety are definitely part of Lyme, and anything we can do to keep from sliding into that abyss is worth doing.