New disease from deer tic in Minnesota and Wisconsin

[spfister]

Hi all:
Just saw this on the news here in Minnesota. This new disease is from deer tics is just in Minnesota and Wisconsin ugg.
Well I guess from the article that the disease doesn’t show up from the regular Lyme testing.
Since I live in Minnesota I have some concern, because I was bit by something several weeks ago and had the Lyme test done which showed nothing. Had a large scab on my temple and a reaction of redness and swelling eye swelling, now pain in my neck. My Doctor put me on Doxycycline for my lungs a week ago and the pain in my neck left and then returned when I went off. Well I’m going back to see if I can get this lymes test.
Love to hear any comments,

http://www.jsonline.com/features/health/126733503.html

Shari

[Maz]

@spfister wrote:

Just saw this on the news here in Minnesota. This new disease is from deer tics is just in Minnesota and Wisconsin ugg.

Hi Shari,

The plot thickens, eh? Only a few weeks ago, they announced that ticks in MN were also passing a pretty nasty Powassan virus….similar symptoms. Is it any wonder that Lyme patients are frustrated when they get a boatload of infections that no one can test for and no one is therefore looking for (or vice-versa)?

viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6251&p=55367&hilit=powassan#p55367

[KathyF]

If someone is bitten by a tick and discovers it, would it be wise for a doctor to go ahead and give them doxycycline or some other antibiotic to treat it? It’s scary how new bacterial viruses from ticks keep appearing. I wonder how many different viruses have been found from ticks?

[Maz]

@KathyF wrote:

If someone is bitten by a tick and discovers it, would it be wise for a doctor to go ahead and give them doxycycline or some other antibiotic to treat it? It’s scary how new bacterial viruses from ticks keep appearing. I wonder how many different viruses have been found from ticks?

Hi Kathy,

Looks like you’re a newcomer here, so just a note to welcome you! 🙂

Personally, having learned the hard way about tick bites due to how Lyme and its nasty hitch-hiking friends affected me, my money is definitely on early prophylactic treatment with doxy after a tick bite, with or without an EM rash. 😉 When my daughter had a deer-tick embedded between her toes a couple years ago, I couldn’t take any risks with her…her uncle has MS, my MIL has PsA and AS and I got RA from Lyme. I took her to my LLMD when the ped ID refused to treat (unless a standard test showed positive or objective symptoms arose) and he immediately put her on doxy for 2 months straight…he didn’t think it was worth risking not treating her either.

There are some Lyme experts who say probably everyone in the NE US has been exposed to Lyme at some point in their lives…and most will never know it or be affected by it. However, for those of us who do get a nasty strain, certain genetic proclivities or have compromised immunity, it’s just not worth taking the risk. As doxy is prescribed every day to teens with acne, if it can prevent a lifetime of suffering to take it for a month or two (just in case), then my personal take is that it is well worth it. After all, if a person travels to parts of the world that are risky for malaria, then doxy is easy to obtain as a prophylactic…why not Lyme, I wonder?

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