Lyme disease and associated infections

Vector-borne illness including lyme disease and associated infections is an emerging global pandemic accelerated by climate change and human encroachment into natural environments. It is increasingly recognized as an underlying cause of many chronic health issues, including fibromyalgia, autoimmune disease, pain syndromes, mental illness, neurodegenerative conditions, and other complex chronic illnesses that have long gone unexplained. It is known as the great imitator as it’s symtoms can be confusing, diverse, affect many body systems and mimic other diseases.

My personal interest in this area recently deepened when several members of my own family—after years of living with chronic pain and fatigue that no one could figure out—were finally diagnosed with multiple vector-borne infections. Since then I have persued extensive education and research into various treatment options and testing. I work with herbal medicine and antibiotics and taylor protocols to individual preferences and comfort levels.

I’ve made it a priority to test all of my patients with chronic pain, autoimmune conditions, fibromyalgia, long COVID, and other “mystery illness” presentations. What I’m finding is frequent and extensive infection in this population, often presenting as, or overlapping with long COVID, complicating recovery and prolonging symptoms. It is now widely accepted that COVID can reactivate dormant infections, such as epstein bar and mycloplasma pneumoniae, and it appears that it is doing the same for vector borne infections such as lyme.

If you’re struggling with unexplained chronic illness, chronic vector-borne infection needs to be considered—even if you don’t remember a tick bite or live in a region traditionally labeled as Lyme endemic. These pathogens can remain dormant for years, triggered later by stress, trauma, or viral illness.

If you have ever been diagnosed with and/or treated for lyme by a conventional doctor, with a short course of antibiotics such a 1 month or less of doxycycline or a single IV antibiotic for neurolyme and still have symtoms it is very likely that you were incompletely treated and that co-infections such as babesia and bartonella were not tested for, diagnosed and eradicated. These can cause lifelong debilitating illness that may be written off as post lyme disease treatment syndrome, where in fact you may have an ongoing active infection with lyme that was incompletely treated or co-infections with other bugs that were never identified.

Lyme complex illness is a chronic polymicrobial infection including multiple pathogenic organisms: Borrelia (Lyme disease), Bartonella, Babesia, tick borne relapsing fever, Anaplasma, Rickettsia, Brucella, and others. Lyme disease is almost never found alone in a sick person and chronic cases do not usually present with classic acute illness symtoms. These organisms can be transmitted by ticks, fleas, lice, spiders, and other insect vectors. Standard testing often fails to detect them, which is why a deeper investigation is often necessary using specialized testing and/or clinical diagnosis. These are treatable conditions-but only if we know to look for them. I am a current ILADS member and continually educating myself on the latest research, testing and treatment protocols in this field.