Lyme Disease, Part 4

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

Lyme disease is a difficult condition to diagnose. Testing is often ordered incorrectly, or the tests ordered are not the best available.

Most commercial tests designed to detect chronic infections are based on measuring your body’s immune reaction (the presence of antibodies) to the microbe. The problem with Lyme is that the primary cells it infects are white blood cells themselves. Why is this a problem? Because if white blood cells are infected, they lose the ability to produce antibodies, which is what the tests are looking for. This is a false negative test result.

There are direct blood tests for the co-infections associated with Lyme, such as Babesia. But, the blood tests have difficulties too. For example, the FISH test for Babesia is done on blood, but it lives primarily in the central nervous system, joints and connective tissue. It doesn’t live in the blood stream, at least in significant amounts, so it is easily missed when looking in the blood.

Lyme Disease, Part 3

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

In the third article of this series, we will look at the common presentations of Lyme disease.

Unfortunately, Lyme disease is a very difficult to diagnose using conventional tests. There is great variation in the presentation of the disease. Your particular symptoms will vary greatly depending on where you have contracted it (joints, muscles, nervous tissue, etc.) and whether or not you have coexisting infections, which most do.

Dr. Klinghardt, well known for his successful treatment of neurological illness and chronic pain with Integrative Medicine, says, “underneath that (Lyme infection), there’s often an infection with Mycoplasma. We still don’t know if it’s really transferred with the same bite or if people had it all along and become symptomatic when the immune system is suppressed by the spirochetes.”

Lyme Disease, Part 2

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

Lyme disease is escalating to epidemic proportions here in the United States. There is much controversy surrounding it. Too many people are still being told it is all in their head. Each year thousands of people go undiagnosed or misdiagnosed. There are many establishment doctors that still do not believe chronic Lyme exists. There are those who still believe that only ticks can infect a person, and those who do not believe you can get the disease, even if you actually see an imbedded tick and get it out, within 24-36 hours.

So where does the truth lie? Well, here are some of the things the experts on Lyme are putting forth.

Lyme can be contracted from many sources: ticks, mosquitos, spiders, fleas, and mites, to name a few. This is probably why so few people with Lyme recall a tick bite. There is also increasing evidence that Lyme disease may be transmitted sexually and congenitally. That is somewhat controversial at this point, but the evidence is mounting.

Lyme Disease, Part 1

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

This week, we will start a series of articles on Lyme disease. Much of this information was compiled by Dr. Mercola in a recent article he penned for his email newsletter. In my research, the data I’ve found on many internet sites points to Lyme disease as an epidemic just now being recognized for the horror it has become.

Lyme disease was named after the town of Lyme, Connecticut, where it was first identified in 1975. (Yes, it is Lyme, not Lyme’s disease.) Initially, it was named “Lyme arthritis” due to the presentation of atypical arthritis in children of that town. It took until 1977 to discover the “deer tick” was linked to the transmission of the disease.

It wasn’t until 1082 that the bacteria responsible for the disease were discovered by Dr. Willy Burgdorfer. The Spirochete, Borrelia Burgdorferi, named after him, and a cousin to the bacteria which causes syphilis, was the culprit in this disease.

Medical Tourism

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

The costs of medical care in the United States are spiraling upward at unsustainable rates. The monstrosity of regulations forced upon us in the legislation labeled Obamacare is making things much worse. There is no chance it will do an ounce of good.

Why are prices of medical services here in the US so high? Well, some say, we have the best care on earth, right? Our doctors are better trained, we have better facilities and therefore we have better outcomes, right? Actually, not right! We do not have better care for the money we spend. The US spends more on health care than the next 10 biggest spenders combined! AND, we rank last in terms of quality of care among those leading industrialized countries.

Slow Down & CHEW!

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

You’ve probably heard many a parent telling their children to stop eating so fast, slow down and chew your food. I used to hear it all the time growing up. I think I could have been done with my plate of food before Mom and Dad even started! I was in a hurry to get back outside and play.

Have you ever noted how people around you eat when you are at a restaurant?  Some eat slow and talk their way through a meal, while others are all business, get it in and get it down! I’ve often heard it said you should chew each bite 25 times. Whoever came up with that, I have no idea, but it sounds a bit like over kill to me. At that point why not just puree it?

Believe it or not, there really are physiological and psychological reasons to chew your food properly. What is properly chewing a bite of food? Well, I haven’t found anything to be too dogmatic about, and the amount each food needs masticated (chewed) obviously depends on what it is. It is not necessarily how many times you chew each bite, but how each morsel taken in ends up before you swallow it. Eating on the run or in front of the TV is not conducive to good food processing. Unfortunately, short school lunch periods and half hour lunches at work tend to force us into fast eating and a bad habit. You should eat purposefully, taking smaller bites, chewing slow and steady, and fully breaking down each bite until it has lost its basic texture. You need to finish chewing and swallow completely, prior to taking another bite. Do not wash your food down with liquid. That is not to say don’t drink with your meal, just don’t chew half way and wash it down with drink.

Fish Oil & Prostate Cancer

Articles by Dr. Erdman are for informational purposes, and are not to be taken as specific medical advice.

On July 10^th, the headline read, “Men Might Want to Shun Fish oils, Study Shows.” This new study from the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center supposedly shows a link between increased EPA/DHA levels in the blood and prostate cancer risk. Given all the positive health effects linked to fish oil intake, this study definitely seems out of step with previously shown benefits.

As I have said before, always try to find out more about who did the study, how it was performed and if it has been repeated by others. I am no expert in these activities, but I have found a great article written by an expert, Dr. Michael Murray. He is a leading authority on natural medicine, and has written over 30 books on health and nutrition. Much of the following information is attributed to this article: “How a SELECTed Bad Study Became Big News,” written on July 12, 2013, and published online at GreenMedinfo.com.

Dr. Murray says the pedigree of this study is impressive. It was published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute and was conducted by researchers at the Fred Hutchinson Cancer Center in Seattle, WA. Yet, the data used is from the much maligned Selenium and Vitamin # Cancer Prevention Trial, or SELECT. That is the problem.