Archive for the ‘Uncategorized’ Category

Tiny Tick Big Controversy ABC Special Report

  Published on Feb 4, 2016 WMDT-TV Channel 47 Documentary on Lyme.  Approx. 25 minutes

See local Lyme patients, hear interviews with specialists, as well as medical professionals who don’t necessarily believe in chronic Lyme disease. Emily Lampa, senior reporter for WMDT-TV, courageously took on this challenge and created the documentary, “Tiny Tick Big Controversy”.

The prevention of tick-borne illnesses is much more complicated than just avoiding ticks. One of the major reasons is that the diagnosis and treatment of the most common vector-borne infection, Lyme Disease, is still such a mystery and so often clouded by controversy.

 

Category:

Activism, Lyme, Ticks, Uncategorized

Study Showing Results Testing Babesia Microti

Babesiosis in the blood supply is a big problem.  This study was to determine the effectiveness of Enzyme Immunoassay (EIA).  The study, in Transfusion, showed that (EIA) for B. microti had a specificity in a non endemic population of 99.93%.  It had a sensitivity of 91.1% among clinical babesiosis patients who are IFA-positive, and is said to work well and is cost effective.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/trf.13618/abstract  Levin, A. E., Williamson, P. C., Bloch, E. M., Clifford, J., Cyrus, S., Shaz, B. H., Kessler, D., Gorlin, J., Erwin, J. L., Krueger, N. X., Williams, G. V., Penezina, O., Telford, S. R., Branda, J. A., Krause, P. J., Wormser, G. P., Schotthoefer, A. M., Fritsche, T. R. and Busch, M. P. (2016), Serologic screening of United States blood donors for Babesia microti using an investigational enzyme immunoassay. Transfusion. doi: 10.1111/trf.13618
This project was supported by the National Heart Lung and Blood Institute at the National Institutes of Health through SBIR Phase I and Phase II Contract HHSN268201000047C, and by Blood Systems Research Institute Contract 10734.

BACKGROUND
The tick-borne pathogen Babesia microti has become recognized as the leading infectious risk associated with blood transfusion in the United States, yet no Food and Drug Administration–licensed screening tests are currently available to mitigate this risk. The aim of this study was to evaluate the performance of an investigational enzyme immunoassay (EIA) for B. microti as a screening test applied to endemic and nonendemic blood donor populations.
STUDY DESIGN AND METHODS
The study aimed to test 20,000 blood donors from areas of the United States considered endemic for B. microti and 10,000 donors from a nonendemic area with the investigational B. microti EIA. Repeat-reactive samples were retested by polymerase chain reaction (PCR), blood smear, immunofluorescent assay (IFA), and immunoblot assay. In parallel, serum samples from symptomatic patients with confirmed babesiosis were tested by EIA, IFA, and immunoblot assays.
RESULTS
A total of 38 of 13,757 (0.28%) of the donors from New York, 7 of 4583 (0.15%) from Minnesota, and 11 of 8363 (0.13%) from New Mexico were found repeat reactive by EIA. Nine of the 56 EIA repeat-reactive donors (eight from New York and one from Minnesota) were positive by PCR. The specificity of the assay in a nonendemic population was 99.93%. Among IFA-positive clinical babesiosis patients, the sensitivity of the assay was 91.1%.
CONCLUSION
The B. microti EIA detected PCR-positive, potentially infectious blood donors in an endemic population and exhibited high specificity among uninfected and unexposed individuals. The EIA promises to provide an effective tool for blood donor screening for B. microti in a format amenable to high-throughput and cost-effective screening.

Category:

Babesia, Uncategorized

Fry and Die

http://www.wsj.com/articles/a-six-minute-plan-to-rid-clothes-of-ticks-1464635032

A study in the journal Ticks and Tick-borne Diseases, says just six minutes spinning dry clothes in a hot dryer should kill all ticks and reduce the risk of tick-related illnesses.  The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention currently recommends washing tick-infested clothes and then drying them for one hour.

The recent research found that drying time can be significantly reduced if clothes aren’t washed first, as ticks are extremely sensitive to dryness.

“The researchers washed and dried hundreds of lab-raised blacklegged ticks (Ixodes scapularis) and immature nymphs, five at a time, in cloth bags in residential washers and dryers in Vermont, Maine and Massachusetts. Ticks and nymphs that survived washing were dried with wet towels at low and high heat. Control ticks were placed in containers at room temperature. In separate experiments, bugs were dried—without pre-washing—with dry towels at various temperatures.

The bugs survived cold-water washes, 94% survived warm-water washes, and 50% survived hot-water washes. Ticks that survived washing took 70 minutes to kill in dryers on low heat and 50 minutes at high heat. All control ticks survived for 24 hours.

By comparison, all ticks and nymphs dried with dry towels were killed in four to 11 minutes, depending on the temperature.

The researchers did include a caveat. The cloth bags that the ticks were washed and dried in may have protected the ticks from heat and dryness.”

While it might give all of us maniacal pleasure to “Fry and Dry” ticks, how about we collect them for researchers?

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/02/18/send-ticks-on-vacation/  You can send them to Arizona or to Coppe Lab in Wisconsin:

Coppe Laboratories
W229 N1870 Westwood Dr.
Waukesha, WI 53186

(262) 574-0701
(262) 574-0703
info@coppelabs.com

If you want to send them to Coppe, put the tick in a zip lock baggie and stick in your freezer.  Contact the lab and they will send you what you need to get them to the lab alive.

While this may not seem as fun you can relish the fact the researchers have to squish all the stomach contents out and spin them in a centrifuge or something – so they will still suffer.

For more info about how ticks survive extreme cold, see:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.com/2016/01/20/polar-vorticks/

Category:

Ticks, Uncategorized

Nutritional Video

MSIDS (multi systemic infectious disease syndrome – or Lyme with friends) patients are faced with numerous decisions when they finally get diagnosed:  1) Finding a LLMD (lyme literate doctor – specially trained to effectively treat the disease(s), 2) Having to change ingrained habits such as diet, sleep habits, and basically revamping everything in their lives, despite the fact they are often cognitively impaired and can hardly think let alone make major decisions.  It can be an enormous task just separating medications!

The following video is excellent at explaining many nutritional myths we’ve grown up with including – fat is bad.  It also points out a few things that are helpful for weight loss, since many MSIDS patients gain weight while in treatment.  

It also discusses digestive enzymes with ingredients I cover in the article about systemic enzymes:  https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.wordpress.com/2016/04/22/systemic-enzymes/

Warning:  It does become an infomercial toward the end.  Again, I’m not selling anything or advocating this particular brand.  You could just as easily take each of these ingredients separately; however, it may help some of you get started, particularly if you don’t have the brain power to hunt down all of these things yourself.  Some LLMD’s personally go to supplement labs and have reputable supplements in their office which can truly help with decisions patients have to make.  Others; however, only give antibiotics.  Since this disease(s) is so invasive and can infect and monkey with every part of the body, it’s imperative to replace what the body isn’t making or is imbalanced in, have a good, nutritional diet, as well as making sure the body is detoxing all of these dead organisms.

http://3harmfulfoods.com/video_022516a_5.php  Dr. Amy Lee, Bariatric Physician
Dr. Lee has board certifications in internal medicine, physician nutrition and obesity medicine specialty. She practices internal medicine with a heavy emphasis on nutrition, wellness and weight management. Her goal is to standardize a diet plan that is evidence based through educating her patients and providing proven solutions that work.

A Review of Bio X4:   http://supplementpolice.com/bio-x4/

Category:

diet and nutrition, Uncategorized

May Meeting Reminder

https://madisonarealymesupportgroup.wordpress.com/2016/05/09/may-meetings-coppe-labs/

Don’t forget Dr. Baewer of Coppe Labs will be speaking this Saturday (May 28, 2016) at 2:30pm about Powassan Virus, other Arboviruses, and Coppe’s research.

See you there!

Category:

Meetings, Uncategorized, Viruses