Thursday, July 14, 2005
Lyme disese fells intrepid gardener-columnist, not for long; also good dental advice
LOOKING AHEAD by Wally Dobelis
Well, it has happened, after years of warning T&V readership about Lyme disease, this garden enthusiast has been struck. Whether it was due to hanging around and admiring the gorgeous Spring greenery in Stuyvesant Square Park, Union Square Park, Gramercy Park, Stuyvesant Town Oval or working upstate is uncertain, the thing to note is that the tick season is on, full swing, with Gov. Pataki having declared May the Lyme Disease Prevention Month. Do not lie down on the gorgeous green lawns of the Stuyvesant Town Oval, thinking that no deer was ever sighted there. Field mice, ubiquitous in our world, are the spreaders of the affliction. In 2003 there were 23,000 reported cases nationally and some 4,400 in New York State, and untold multiples more not bothering to treat, or seeking diagnoses and having been told that it is nothing to worry about. Early blood tests, within a couple of weeks of the event, clear the air.
In my case, I scraped a painful spot underarm spot while showering. Checking the hard to reach location with a hand mirror, a tiny black residue showed. Soon a small red spot developed, and some days later I called my upstate hospital’s emergency room, a place where they see Lyme disease every day, I was told to put om disinfectant, and see a physician if the red does not go away. It was no longer sensitive, so I forgot about it until three weeks after the incident the spot became sensitive, and the hand-mirror showed a red bulls-eye, two inches in diameter.
We were back in the city, for a dental appointment, so I called our uptown family physician, not far from the dentist’s office, and the nurse squeezed me in for a five-minute visit. She took my blood, and the doctor showed up, took one look, asked about the history and immediately wrote a two-week prescription for Doxycycline, the established antibiotic used for this affliction, two capsules a day for two weeks, with renewals. Treatment was to start immediately, two weeks if the blood tests were negative, three if positive.
If the prescription strategy seems strange, is because false negative blood tests are not uncommon. Lyme disease is the great dissembler, imitating other afflictions. The Borrelia burgdorfi bacilli can cause fevers, joint pains, arthritic reactions, symptoms of Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction Syndrome, and more. Physicians recognize several reasons for false negatives in testing blood, mostly because of presence of antibodies that have suppressed the bacteria, such as recent treatment by antibiotics. Anti-inflammation steroidal drugs suppress the immune system and prevent an antibody response. Further, it is possible that the Bb bacteria and the patient’s antibodies have not been bound long enough to produce a response. This process can take as long as six weeks and prudent advice is not to wait but begin treatment even if early blood tests are negative It is also possible that the Bb have changed their makeup and are not recognized by the immune system, or have overwhelmed the latter – ugh, what a thought. The laboratories doing the testing may also be at fault, setting the limits too high – the tests, known as ELICE and Western blot, are same as for AIDS screening.
In my case, the blood tests came out negative, but I continued taking the green capsule twice a day for two weeks, and the red bullet disappeared. It is important to finish the course; untreated Lyme disease can have severe consequences in 15% of such cases. It is not enough to take precautions while walking through tall grass where the larvae of the tick are waving their legs, trying to attach to any passing body that emits warmth; you have to be careful with household pets. Keeping lawns cut short, if your cats go outdoors is important, as is examining them upon return.
An observation about protective (?) clothing. Combining my uptown MD visit with a dental appointment, I walked down Lexington Ave, drinking in the strange atmosphere around Bloomingdale’s, just like a tourist. There were out-of-towners and foreigners in tiny micros, locals more dressed except for three office-type blondes, seen separately, with décolletages down to their waistlines, just like in the fashion shots. Did some research in Bloomie’s, needing some walking shorts, and can report that Ralph Lauren is doing his bit to reverse the trade imbalance. His Polo brand offers chino camp shorts in tan and peach with cargo pockets decorated with two flaps and four buttons each (rainprotection?) at $59, made in Indonesia – the tourists seem to be buying, giving us Euros. A slightly gussied-up model, cotton and linen, with a button fly and a cargo pocket with a fashion buckle made in Malaysia cost a staggering $165. The long-pants model is $225, and can be had with two drawstrings at each ankle leg (Lyme tick protection?) and more strings at the waist (unknown purpose). Being more the Bermuda shorts type, I restrained my buying impulses.
I eventually reached my dentist’s office, but will spare you the hygienist’s most helpful (though scathing) advice, this time. Check www.dobelis.net.
Oh, well, why not…She reminded me that brushing and flossing every 24-48 hrs is needed to loosen the plaque, a substance of mouth bacteria and food residue that,left unattended, forms into rocklike tartar at the gumline.That’s all. This professional hates flossing and prefers using thin plastic toothpicks, Rota-Point, that pass through between teeth as efficiently as dental floss. She also uses a vibratingelectric brush that gets at the plaque from all angles, better than therotating electric brush. Loosened plaque does not reattach, rinse it out..As for tartar, it makes the gums recede and causes a gum disease, gingivitis, that can turn into the bone disease, peridontitis, that can destroy the teeth affected.Even though you limit your intake of soft bread and sugars and eat crunchy vegetables and grainy breads that self clean your teeth, having a hygienist scrape the tartar off every six months (no less than once a year)prevents gum disease. I’m sorry, no miracle cures.
Well, it has happened, after years of warning T&V readership about Lyme disease, this garden enthusiast has been struck. Whether it was due to hanging around and admiring the gorgeous Spring greenery in Stuyvesant Square Park, Union Square Park, Gramercy Park, Stuyvesant Town Oval or working upstate is uncertain, the thing to note is that the tick season is on, full swing, with Gov. Pataki having declared May the Lyme Disease Prevention Month. Do not lie down on the gorgeous green lawns of the Stuyvesant Town Oval, thinking that no deer was ever sighted there. Field mice, ubiquitous in our world, are the spreaders of the affliction. In 2003 there were 23,000 reported cases nationally and some 4,400 in New York State, and untold multiples more not bothering to treat, or seeking diagnoses and having been told that it is nothing to worry about. Early blood tests, within a couple of weeks of the event, clear the air.
In my case, I scraped a painful spot underarm spot while showering. Checking the hard to reach location with a hand mirror, a tiny black residue showed. Soon a small red spot developed, and some days later I called my upstate hospital’s emergency room, a place where they see Lyme disease every day, I was told to put om disinfectant, and see a physician if the red does not go away. It was no longer sensitive, so I forgot about it until three weeks after the incident the spot became sensitive, and the hand-mirror showed a red bulls-eye, two inches in diameter.
We were back in the city, for a dental appointment, so I called our uptown family physician, not far from the dentist’s office, and the nurse squeezed me in for a five-minute visit. She took my blood, and the doctor showed up, took one look, asked about the history and immediately wrote a two-week prescription for Doxycycline, the established antibiotic used for this affliction, two capsules a day for two weeks, with renewals. Treatment was to start immediately, two weeks if the blood tests were negative, three if positive.
If the prescription strategy seems strange, is because false negative blood tests are not uncommon. Lyme disease is the great dissembler, imitating other afflictions. The Borrelia burgdorfi bacilli can cause fevers, joint pains, arthritic reactions, symptoms of Chronic Fatigue and Immune Dysfunction Syndrome, and more. Physicians recognize several reasons for false negatives in testing blood, mostly because of presence of antibodies that have suppressed the bacteria, such as recent treatment by antibiotics. Anti-inflammation steroidal drugs suppress the immune system and prevent an antibody response. Further, it is possible that the Bb bacteria and the patient’s antibodies have not been bound long enough to produce a response. This process can take as long as six weeks and prudent advice is not to wait but begin treatment even if early blood tests are negative It is also possible that the Bb have changed their makeup and are not recognized by the immune system, or have overwhelmed the latter – ugh, what a thought. The laboratories doing the testing may also be at fault, setting the limits too high – the tests, known as ELICE and Western blot, are same as for AIDS screening.
In my case, the blood tests came out negative, but I continued taking the green capsule twice a day for two weeks, and the red bullet disappeared. It is important to finish the course; untreated Lyme disease can have severe consequences in 15% of such cases. It is not enough to take precautions while walking through tall grass where the larvae of the tick are waving their legs, trying to attach to any passing body that emits warmth; you have to be careful with household pets. Keeping lawns cut short, if your cats go outdoors is important, as is examining them upon return.
An observation about protective (?) clothing. Combining my uptown MD visit with a dental appointment, I walked down Lexington Ave, drinking in the strange atmosphere around Bloomingdale’s, just like a tourist. There were out-of-towners and foreigners in tiny micros, locals more dressed except for three office-type blondes, seen separately, with décolletages down to their waistlines, just like in the fashion shots. Did some research in Bloomie’s, needing some walking shorts, and can report that Ralph Lauren is doing his bit to reverse the trade imbalance. His Polo brand offers chino camp shorts in tan and peach with cargo pockets decorated with two flaps and four buttons each (rainprotection?) at $59, made in Indonesia – the tourists seem to be buying, giving us Euros. A slightly gussied-up model, cotton and linen, with a button fly and a cargo pocket with a fashion buckle made in Malaysia cost a staggering $165. The long-pants model is $225, and can be had with two drawstrings at each ankle leg (Lyme tick protection?) and more strings at the waist (unknown purpose). Being more the Bermuda shorts type, I restrained my buying impulses.
I eventually reached my dentist’s office, but will spare you the hygienist’s most helpful (though scathing) advice, this time. Check www.dobelis.net.
Oh, well, why not…She reminded me that brushing and flossing every 24-48 hrs is needed to loosen the plaque, a substance of mouth bacteria and food residue that,left unattended, forms into rocklike tartar at the gumline.That’s all. This professional hates flossing and prefers using thin plastic toothpicks, Rota-Point, that pass through between teeth as efficiently as dental floss. She also uses a vibratingelectric brush that gets at the plaque from all angles, better than therotating electric brush. Loosened plaque does not reattach, rinse it out..As for tartar, it makes the gums recede and causes a gum disease, gingivitis, that can turn into the bone disease, peridontitis, that can destroy the teeth affected.Even though you limit your intake of soft bread and sugars and eat crunchy vegetables and grainy breads that self clean your teeth, having a hygienist scrape the tartar off every six months (no less than once a year)prevents gum disease. I’m sorry, no miracle cures.
# posted by Wally Dobelis @ 10:23 AM 
