Archive for the ‘research’ Category

Serum From White-Tailed Deer Kills Lyme in Test Tube

https://www.umass.edu/news/article/white-tailed-deer-blood-kills-bacteria-causes-lyme-disease

WHITE-TAILED DEER BLOOD KILLS BACTERIA THAT CAUSES LYME DISEASE

NEWVEC research at UMass Amherst may lead to strategies to reduce the incidence of tick-borne illness

As tick season kicks in across the country, the executive director of the University of Massachusetts Amherst-based New England Center of Excellence in Vector-Borne Diseases (NEWVEC) and his team have completed research that offers a promising lead in the fight against Lyme disease.

The study, published recently in the journal Vector-borne and Zoonotic Diseases, demonstrates that the blood of the white-tailed deer kills the corkscrew-shaped bacterium that causes Lyme disease, a potentially debilitating illness. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) estimates that each year some 476,000 people are diagnosed with and treated for Lyme, the most common vector-borne disease in the U.S.

“Deer are vitally important to the survival of deer ticks, but they are not involved with transmitting the Lyme bacteria, Borrelia burgdorferi,” explains senior author Stephen Rich, professor of microbiology. “We’ve known for some time that ticks taken from white-tailed deer are not infected, and we speculated that something about the deer prevented those ticks from becoming infected. But until publication of our paper, no one had done the experiment to show that deer blood – specifically the serum component of white-tailed deer blood – kills Lyme.”

A tick biting a person with the bullseye rash indicative of Lyme disease. Credit: Getty Images
Some people infected with Lyme get a tell-tale target rash around their tick bite. Credit: Getty Images

The results of the study may one day lead to new strategies and approaches for Lyme disease prevention and treatment, says lead author Patrick Pearson, a Ph.D. student in NEWVEC, whose upcoming doctoral examination focuses in part on this research.

“In these experiments we determined that white-tailed deer serum kills the Lyme bacterium. The next important question will be to understand exactly how deer blood kills Lyme bacteria,” Pearson says.

The research is one project of NEWVEC, which was funded by the CDC last year with a $10 million award to prevent and reduce tick- and mosquito-borne diseases in New England. NEWVEC aims to bring together academic communities, public health practitioners, residents and visitors across the Northeast, where Lyme infections are concentrated.

The Lyme disease bacterium is passed to juvenile blacklegged (Ixodes scapularis) deer ticks from mice the arthropods feed on. The infected ticks then pass the bacterium on to humans when they feed on people.

“We are the accidental host,” Rich says. “The ticks that bite us are actually looking for a deer because that’s where they breed. Without the deer, you don’t have ticks. But if you had only deer, you wouldn’t have any Lyme.”

To carry out their experiment, the researchers obtained blood serum from a semi-captive white-tailed deer herd at Auburn University in Alabama. The deer were believed to have no exposure to ticks and the bacteria that causes Lyme disease.

The researchers then grew the Lyme disease germ in test tubes and added the deer serum. “And lo and behold, it killed the bacteria,” Rich says. “Whatever it is in the deer that’s killing the germ is part of the innate immune system, a part of the immune system that precedes antibodies.”

Pearson adds, “The Lyme bacterium has proteins on its surface that protect it from the human innate immune system. Deer blood is somehow different such that Lyme bacteria are apparently unable to protect themselves from the innate immune system of white-tailed deer.”

The next research step is to determine the precise mechanisms in deer blood that kill the bacteria.

“We’d like to determine if it’s something we can induce in humans,” Rich says. “Or maybe we could use this somehow to our advantage to reduce the incidence of Lyme disease in the wild.”

_______________

**Comment**

Go here for more on tick prevention.

While the age-old repellents permethrin, Deet, and Picaridin are all mentioned in the article, a few new things are in the pipeline:

  • GearJump Technologies received DoD funding to design a controlled-release device utilizing synthetic pyrethroids (not to be put on skin) transfluthrin and metofluthrin that can attach to the boot of soldiers has shown affected ticks became slower moving, less mobile and appeared to be in a “drunken-like state.”
  • Nootkatone, derived from Alaska yellow cedar trees and citrus fruit, had statistically significant knockdown effects when compared to water-only controls.  It also displayed significant residual tick-killing activity after weathering naturally in the landscape for 2 weeks prior to tick application/testing.
    • While this article states products could be available by 2022, they are obviously not forthcoming. This NY Times article explains it’s considered safe and is used in food and perfume, but the EPA registration only applies only to Nootkatone – not forthcoming products which will each need to be tested and registered.
    • The CDC has licensed patents to its partners Evolva and Allylix. The substance is available to be used to develop new insect repellents and insecticides.  And this is exactly what is wrong with the CDC.  I heard about Nootkatone years and years ago and it’s languished on the sidelines like so many things due to CDC patents/influence.
    • The chemical repels mosquitoes, ticks, bedbugs, fleas and may be effective against lice, sandflies, midges, and other pests. An ISU insect toxicologist found it to be an “impressive repellent but a weak insecticide.” It can kill insects but takes a vast amount of product making it impractical.  Nootkatone repels ticks better than synthetics and is their equal at repelling mosquitoes.  Unlike other natural products, it does not lose its potency after an hour but lasts as long as synthetics.

Knowing that Lyme/MSIDS is a modern-day plague, it’s disheartening that good, safe, affordable products are not being developed more quickly.  This shouldn’t shock anyone; however, as it’s become perfectly clear that public health is not about public health but patents, secret royalties, collusion, fraud, and control.

Many other animals are involved and utilized by ticks besides mice:

Category:

Lyme, Prevention, research, Transmission

When Lyme Changes Your Brain

https://www.lymedisease.org/lyme-related-brain-fog-is-real/

Advanced imaging shows Lyme-related brain fog is real

By Nancy Dougherty
Johns Hopkins Medicine Lyme Disease Research Center

There are approximately 476,000 people diagnosed with Lyme disease annually in the US. Of these, an estimated 10-20% suffer from impairing symptoms well beyond the acute phase of infection.

Persistent symptoms include severe fatigue, pain, and cognitive problems. Vexingly, these symptoms can be difficult to validate using current diagnostic tests.

Patients are often told by their health practitioners: “your tests are normal, it’s in your head” (aka psychosomatic).

Researchers have discovered, however, that by using more advanced imaging modalities, brain changes can be objectively detected in Lyme disease patients.

For example, clinical researchers at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine have used novel PET imaging, functional MRI (fMRI), and diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) to identify inflammatory, functional, and structural abnormalities in the brains of Lyme disease patients as compared to healthy controls.

Their findings indicate that Lyme-disease-associated brain alterations are biologic and measurable, not psychosomatic. These discoveries are significant but not yet well known by the physician community or broadly available to clinicians.

What does “brain fog” mean?

Brain fog is a term used to describe difficulties with cognitive functions such as working memory, focusing, concentrating, planning, organizing, word recall, processing speed, and mental fatigue.

Working memory enables one to do tasks quickly or easily solve a problem without looking up information. This includes quickly learning a new computer program or using names or numbers for a routine task.

Mental fatigue is akin to how one feels after taking a long test that requires remembering detailed information or doing a complicated mental task when short on sleep.

What are the limitations of current clinical tests for Lyme-associated brain fog?

Brain fog is commonly experienced by Lyme disease patients but difficult to detect because cognitive deficits can be too subtle for standard diagnostic tests to uncover.

Usual blood tests appear normal in Lyme encephalopathy or brain fog (CBC; CMP: kidney, liver, glucose, thyroid; ESR, CRP).

Serum blood testing for 2-tier IgG Borrelia burgdorferi antibody seropositivity may be negative in patients, such as those with past antibiotic treatment.

Clinically available MRI imaging is usually normal or shows nonspecific changes. Cerebrospinal fluid examination findings are usually normal as well. In some cases, the CSF fluid may show evidence of a mild form of encephalomyelitis, but this is rare.

Formal cognitive testing with a neuropsychologist to characterize the type and severity of cognitive problems can be a more helpful approach. Working memory and processing speed have been shown to be impacted in Lyme disease patients using standardized neuropsychological measures.[i] However, patient-reported cognitive complaints are subjective, and objective measures of cognitive decline are sought after by patients and clinicians.

What does more advanced neuroimaging reveal?

Non-standard research-grade neuroimaging technologies have discovered marked biologic abnormalities in patients with Lyme disease as compared to healthy controls.

A Columbia University brain PET imaging study (2009) found hypometabolism in Lyme-disease-associated encephalopathy.[ii]

A Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine brain PET imaging study (2018) revealed increased inflammation and glial activation in patients with Lyme-disease-associated persistent symptoms.[iii]

A 2022 Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine neuroimaging study utilized fMRI and DTI brain scans in conjunction with each other. These scans identified striking functional abnormalities as well as distinct structural changes in the white brain matter of Lyme disease patients.[iv]

What is the significance of these neuroimaging findings?

John Aucott, MD, Director of the Johns Hopkins Medicine Lyme Disease Research Center and Associate Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, explains, “The cause of Lyme-disease-associated persistent symptoms typically cannot be identified with regular MRIs, CT scans, or blood tests. However, in a research setting, more sophisticated PET, fMRI, and DTI imaging approaches have found significant objective abnormalities in the brains of Lyme disease patients compared with healthy controls.”

Cherie Marvel, PhD, lead author of the fMRI/DTI study and Associate Professor, Departments of Neurology & Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine, describes fMRI as “a quantitative ‘brain stress test’ that measures brain function during cognitive tasks.”

Dr. Marvel explains that “the brain scans indicate Lyme disease patients’ brains work harder than normal and unexpectedly by activating white matter in the frontal lobe to try to maintain normal function.”

DTI, a measure of structural brain integrity, confirms abnormalities in the same white matter regions as observed in the fMRI scans.

These novel neuroimaging results provide new objective validation of a biologic basis for the brain fog reported by Lyme disease patients, including working memory impairment and slower processing speed.

The findings indicate Lyme-disease-associated brain fog is real and likely due to ongoing neuroinflammation driving brain dysfunction. More research is needed to better understand the diagnostic and therapeutic implications of these notable discoveries and to bring new insights and more advanced tools into the clinic to help patients.

Big picture

The Lyme-disease-associated advanced neuroimaging brain findings may be relevant to other infection-associated chronic illnesses where neuroinflammation is also significant, including Long COVID and ME/CFS. On June 29-30, 2023, a National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine workshop will “examine common biological and clinical factors associated with infection-associated chronic illnesses.” Infection-associated brain fog is one topic this workshop can hopefully shine additional light on to help accelerate knowledge and solutions for patients.

Nancy Dougherty is an Education and Communications Consultant for Johns Hopkins Medicine Lyme Disease Research Center. Follow her on Twitter: @NancyNDougherty.

References

[i] Touradji P, Aucott JN, Yang T, Rebman AW, Bechtold KT. Cognitive Decline in Post-treatment Lyme Disease Syndrome. Arch Clin Neuropsychol. 2019 Jun 1;34(4):455-465. doi: 10.1093/arclin/acy051. PMID: 29945190. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/29945190/

[ii] Fallon BA, Lipkin RB, Corbera KM, Yu S, Nobler MS, Keilp JG, Petkova E, Lisanby SH, Moeller JR, Slavov I, Van Heertum R, Mensh BD, Sackeim HA. Regional cerebral blood flow and metabolic rate in persistent Lyme encephalopathy. Arch Gen Psychiatry. 2009 May;66(5):554-63. doi: 10.1001/archgenpsychiatry.2009.29. PMID: 19414715. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19414715/

[iii] Coughlin JM, Yang T, Rebman AW, Bechtold KT, Du Y, Mathews WB, Lesniak WG, Mihm EA, Frey SM, Marshall ES, Rosenthal HB, Reekie TA, Kassiou M, Dannals RF, Soloski MJ, Aucott JN, Pomper MG. Imaging glial activation in patients with post-treatment Lyme disease symptoms: a pilot study using [11C]DPA-713 PET. J Neuroinflammation. 2018 Dec 19;15(1):346. doi: 10.1186/s12974-018-1381-4. PMID: 30567544; PMCID: PMC6299943. https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30567544/

[iv] Marvel CL, Alm KH, Bhattacharya D, Rebman AW, Bakker A, Morgan OP, et al. (2022) A multimodal neuroimaging study of brain abnormalities and clinical correlates in post treatment Lyme disease. PLoS ONE 17(10): e0271425. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0271425

Caption for featured photo: DTI brain images from a 2022 Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine study show white matter changes associated with post treatment Lyme disease.

_________________

**Comment**

What’s important is what will they do with this information and what will they attribute the brain changes to. For instance, currently, and for the entire history of Lyme/MSIDS, these issues have been blamed upon PTLDS – an autoimmune/inflammatory type of condition that will be treated with things like steroids when the very real underlying problem could be persistent infection(s).  This has become highly politicalized, causing polarity in research and medicine.

Unfortunately, this article, like so many others before it emphasizes and pushes the accepted narrative about the consequences or supposed failure of prolonged antibiotics for Lyme/MSIDS.  Everyone understands that prolonged antibiotic use is not without risks; however, nobody seems to care when it’s for acne, salmonella, endocarditis, sickle cell, or rheumatic fever.  Further, this report states there is significant information that supports the safety of prolonged antibiotic use regarding penicillin and its derivatives.

Again it’s about benefit vs risk.

When you are faced with death or a life of misery, all of a sudden the risk of prolonged antibiotics falls on the priority list.  Further, many, including myself and my husband have achieved our health back after this therapy.

Of course antibiotics aren’t the only tool in the tool kit needed for treating Lyme/MSIDS.  It truly is a complicated illness and one must learn all they can about diet, supplements, herbs, immune modulators, etc., but that doesn’t mean antimicrobials don’t have a very important role.  

Lastly, there are good reasons why extended antibiotics haven’t appeared successful in many NIH funded studies.  This is because:

  • typically a monotherapy is utilized, which frankly often isn’t enough with Lyme/MSIDS, plus there’s the concern of antibiotic resistance with this myopic approach
  • often the wrong antibiotic is used
  • often the wrong dosage of antibiotic is used
  • often, individual differences are not taken into account for example, symptoms must be monitored carefully and antibiotics changed when patients hit a plateau.  This approach doesn’t fit into the current research paradigm.
  • many other research design flaws such as only accepting those who test positive on 2-tiered CDC testing which is known to miss more than 70% of all cases, as well accepting patients that have the EM rash which is highly variable
For a fantastic overview on treatment nuances listen to Dr. Burrascano on the history of Lyme which I highlight here. 

In brief:

  • Treat ALL forms of Bb
  • Treat coinfections
  • Treat long enough (Bb is slow-growing and persistent)
  • Make sure blood levels of antibiotics are high enough as people vary.  He discusses amoxicillin and how they found that increasing the dosage to 1,000mg 3X/day and adding probenecid to increase the antibiotic in the blood, people did even better.  He goes on to tell of an unpublished study with Stoneybook where there was a failure rate of 100% of patients taking 300mg of doxycycline a day for 21 days. Yet, how many people are given this exact treatment?
  • Cycle treatment.  This means, once you are symptom-free for 2-4 months, stop treatment.  If symptoms return, treat again.  Burrascano has found that it typically takes 3-4 Cycles before a person remains symptom-free.  The 3rd cycle often yields the worst herx in his experience.

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2018/04/13/chronic-lyme-post-mortem-study-needed-to-end-the-lyme-wars/  In this astute editorial, Microbiologist Tom Greer states:

From the very beginning, treatment failures were seen in virtually every antibiotic study done. The longer the patient follow up, the higher the incidence of treatment failure. The medical community blamed early treatment failures on the older antibiotics erythromycin, tetracycline, and penicillin, and determined that these antibiotics were not very effective at curing Lyme disease. Ignored was the fact that the newer antibiotics were also consistently failing to prevent relapses of active infection. Since these early treatment studies, the concept that two weeks of antibiotic therapy is adequate treatment for Lyme disease has remained ingrained in the medical community’s collective consciousness. [The Long-Term Follow-up of Lyme Disease: A Population-Based Retrospective Cohort Study. Authors: Shadick NA; Phillips CB; Sangha O et al. Ann Intern Med 1999 Dec 21;131(12):919-26]

*Data presented by Dr. Nancy Shadick at an International Lyme Symposia showed that patients in the Nantucket Island study followed for up to 5.2 years after initial antibiotic treatment had ever-climbing relapse rates. Relapse rates in patients receiving two weeks of IV Rocephin (ceftriaxone) could expect a relapse rate to exceed 50% after five years.

There is a smart way to treat this, yet few are nuanced in this skill.  We desperately need post-mortem studies to determine what is keeping people ill.  We need current transmission studies.  We need doctor education on the polymicrobial aspect of this disease. And, we need the stigma & polarization to go away so insurance companies will cover Lyme/MSIDS medical expenses, patients will be believed and supported and the bullying will end.

Category:

Lyme, Psychological Aspects, research

Lyme Carditis Presents Without Typical Lyme Disease Symptoms

https://danielcameronmd.com/lyme-carditis-presents-without-typical-lyme-disease-symptoms/

LYME CARDITIS PRESENTS WITHOUT TYPICAL LYME DISEASE SYMPTOMS

By Dr. Daniel Cameron

lyme-carditis

A case report entitled “An Atypical Case of Lyme Disease Presenting With Lyme Carditis,” by Najam et al. demonstrates the importance of considering Lyme disease in patients who present with signs and symptoms of AV block and no other manifestations of Lyme disease. [1]

The authors describe a 70-year-old male who presented to the hospital without any typical Lyme disease symptoms, but exhibited generalized symptoms of progressive orthopnea and dyspnea on exertion.

The man had a medical history of hypertension and calcific aortic stenosis. His lab results were “significant for an increased erythrocyte sedimentation rate of 136, white blood cell count of 16.6, hemoglobin of 9.3, creatinine of 2.6, and normal liver enzymes. Troponins were negative but his brain natriuretic peptide was elevated at 877. His admitting EKG was significant for bradycardia with a heart rate in the mid-40s and a first-degree AV block.”

“We report a case of a 70-year-old male with Lyme disease presenting with a second-degree, Mobitz type 1 AV block.”

Clinicians considered his symptoms possibly due to anemia, progressive kidney disease, possible congestive heart failure exacerbation, worsening aortic stenosis, and/or pneumonia.

“Due to the prevalence of Lyme disease in the northeast and the patient’s symptomatology, a tick panel was ordered which came back positive for Lyme,” the authors wrote.

The patients were treated with IV Rocephin and oral doxycycline. He had a complete resolution of symptoms with a normal sinus rhythm without AV block.

“This incidence shows the importance of having a Lyme disease diagnosis when regionally appropriate for patients who may present with no other signs or symptoms other than an AV block.”

The authors suggest, “In highly endemic areas such as the northeast and Midwest United States, early recognition and treatment of Lyme disease is important for the prevention of long-term complications of disseminated infection.”

Related Articles:

Pacemakers for Lyme carditis

Successful removal of pacemakers in patients with Lyme carditis

Podcast: 3 deaths associated with Lyme carditis

References:
  1. Najam U S, Sheikh A (March 08, 2023) An Atypical Case of Lyme Disease Presenting With Lyme Carditis. Cureus 15(3): e35907. doi:10.7759/cureus.35907

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**Comment**

Please know patients present “atypically” quite often and just because something is rarely reported, doesn’t mean something is rare.  Due to this deception, patients are kicked to the curb continually.

For more:

Category:

Heart Issues, Lyme, research

Borrelia Miyamotoi Can Be Transmitted From Mother Ticks To Offspring

https://danielcameronmd.com/borrelia-miyamotoi-can-be-transmitted-from-mother-ticks-to-offspring/

BORRELIA MIYAMOTOI CAN BE TRANSMITTED FROM MOTHER TICKS TO OFFSPRING

borrelia-miyamotoi-ticks

Lyme disease and Borrelia miyamotoi can be transmitted from a tick to a host and vice versa (horizontal transmission). B. miyamotoi can also be transmitted from the mother to their offspring (vertical transmission).

By 

In their article “Borrelia miyamotoi: A Comprehensive Review. Pathogens,” Cleveland and colleagues discuss Borrelia miyamotoi as an emerging tick-borne pathogen and and how it can be transmitted from a mother tick to their offspring.

Cleveland et al. reviewed the proposed vertical transmission of B. miyamotoi.¹

  • An adult female tick infected with B. miyamotoi lays eggs.
  • The larva hatch from these eggs infected with B. miyamotoi.
  • The larva, nymph and adult ticks remain infected.

Ticks can acquire B. miyamotoi after feeding on an infected tick – called horizontal transmission.

Cleveland et al. reviewed the proposed horizontal transmission of B. miyamoti.¹

  • The larva, nymph and adult ticks acquire B. miyamoti from feeding on an infected host.
  • The larva, nymph and adult ticks remain infected.

“B. miyamotoi can be transmitted from infected ticks to naïve mice during the first 24 hours of feeding,” the authors wrote.

B. miyamotoi can be transmitted to mice initially through the salivary glands and subsequently transmitted through the midgut.

Concerns surrounding Borrelia miyamotoi

Shapiro and Wormser summarized the challenges associated with B. miyamotoi in the Journal of the American Medical Association.²

  • “This bacterium can be transmitted within the first 24 hours of tick attachment.”
  • “The probability of transmission increases with every day an infected tick is allowed to remain attached.”
  • While some patients with Lyme disease may exhibit a rash, “patients infected with B. miyamotoi in the United States typically do not have a rash.” But they may present with “a fever in conjunction with headache (96%), myalgia (84%), arthralgia (76%), and malaise/fatigue (82%).”
  • There are no diagnostic tests for B. miyamotoi infection that have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration.
  • The fever may be relapsing.
  • “Laboratory abnormalities include leukopenia (51%) and thrombocytopenia (60%), which are rarely seen in Lyme disease.” [Editor’s note: These are also seen in Ehrlichia and Anaplasmosis.]
  • “Severely immunocompromised patients may develop chronic meningitis.”

Fortunately, doxycycline and amoxicillin have been shown to effectively treat B. miyamotoi infection in patients, including those who are immunocompromised.

Editor’s notes: Fevers are infrequent and often do not relapse. The laboratory abnormalities seen in B. miyamotoi are also seen in Ehrlichia and Anaplasmosis. Long-term outcome studies are needed.

References:
  1. Cleveland DW, Anderson CC, Brissette CA. Borrelia miyamotoi: A Comprehensive Review. Pathogens. Feb 7 2023;12(2)doi:10.3390/pathogens12020267
  2. Shapiro ED, Wormser GP. Lyme Disease in 2018: What Is New (and What Is Not). JAMA. Aug 21 2018;320(7):635-636. doi:10.1001/jama.2018.10974

For more:

Category:

Borrelia Miyamotoi (Relapsing Fever Group), research, Testing, Ticks, Transmission

Fatal Case of Heartland Virus

https://danielcameronmd.com/fatal-case-of-heartland-virus/

FATAL CASE OF HEARTLAND VIRUS

fatal-heartland-virus

The Heartland virus (HRTV) is an emerging tick-borne illness which can be acquired through the bite of an infected Lone Star tick. The virus was first reported in 2009 in Missouri. Since then, it has spread to other states including Kansas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa, Georgia, Pennsylvania, New York, and North Carolina, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).

By 

Now, investigators have identified the Heartland virus in the Maryland and Virginia region – an area where the virus is not widely recognized.

In their article “Fatal Case of Heartland Virus Disease Acquired in the Mid-Atlantic Region, United States,”¹ Liu and colleagues describe the fatal case of a man in his 60’s who acquired the Heartland virus in either Maryland or Virginia.

The man was admitted to the hospital in November 2021 with a fever, diarrhea, dyspnea, myalgias, and malaise which had been ongoing for 5 days. He had a history of a splenectomy, hypertension, remote trauma, coronary artery disease, and hypertension.

The patient did not recall a tick bite and did not have an erythema migrans rash.

“The range of [Heartland virus] could be expanding in the United States.”

“An arboviral disease was the leading diagnostic consideration, but limited availability of commercial diagnostic testing for tickborne diseases delayed diagnosis,” wrote Liu et al.

The man was treated clinically for a tick-borne infection with doxycycline.

“Two days later, on day 7 after symptom onset, the patient returned to the emergency department with confusion, an unsteady gait, and new fecal and urinary incontinence,” according to the authors.

He subsequently developed encephalopathy, low sodium, abnormal liver function tests, and fatigue.

“He had acute respiratory failure, renal failure, and a cardiac arrest. He was transitioned to comfort care and died on day 13 after symptom onset,” wrote Liu et al.

An autopsy revealed that the heart, spleen, kidney, and liver samples were positive for Heartland virus.

The Virginia Department of Health conducted a drag of the man’s property and found 193 Lone Star ticks. However, none of the ticks contained HRTV.

Tick-borne diseases identified by the CDC, as of 2/26/23.²

  • Anaplasmosis
  • Babesiosis
  • Borrelia mayonii
  • Borrelia miyamotoi
  • Bourbon virus
  • Colorado tick fever
  • Ehrlichiosis
  • Heartland virus
  • Lyme disease
  • Powassan disease
  • Rocky Mountain spotted fever (RMSF)
  • STARI (Southern tick-associated rash illness)
  • Tick-borne relapsing fever (TBRF)
  • Tularemia
  • 364D rickettsiosis (Rickettsia phillipi, proposed)
Related Articles:

10 cases of Heartland virus reviewed

References:
  1. Liu S, Kannan S, Meeks M, et al. Fatal Case of Heartland Virus Disease Acquired in the Mid-Atlantic Region, United States. Emerg Infect Dis. Feb 23 2023;29(5)doi:10.3201/eid2905.221488
  2. Diseases Transmitted by Ticks. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. https://www.cdc.gov/ticks/diseases/index.html Last accessed 2/26/23.

For more:

Category:

research, Testing, Ticks, Treatment, Viruses