Blood Smears for Babesia monitoring

sierraDon said...
Just curious if anyone had a hematology lab or microbiology lab do blood smears to gauge where they are in their treatment.

I realize that smears are subjective based on the tech. But i saw a few places talk about Giemsa or Wright stains or smears being utilized to gauge treatment progress.

was wondering if anyone had tried that. thanks a lot

Hi sierraDon, there are a number of us on this forum that do this ourselves (namely MustardSeed, bluelyme, Jackss, myself, and perhaps GeorgiaHunter)!! We have our own scopes and find microscopy in general, and darkfield microscopy and Giemsa smears in particular, an insightful tool for our treatment. Jackss and myself have also delved into acridine orange staining for the detection of Bb and the coinfections.

Darkfield (and Phase Contrast) microscopy is THE BEST tool for confirming a Borrelia infection. And Giemsa and Acridine Orange smears are among the best detection methods when it comes to the coinfections. The distinct advantage with microscopy is that you are actually visualizing the organisms. And, having your own scope gives you the distinct advantage of unlimited viewing of your sample. Commercial labs look at your slide for no more than 15 minutes. There is an inherent drawback to that because in CHRONIC INFECTION, the number of (co-infection) organisms in the blood IS EXTREMELY LOW!!

Do a search of the "Microscopy" threads on this forum and you'll find plenty of info. Also, "The Microscopy Thread" on Lymenet.org has a wealth of info from DIY'ers and is more in-depth.

I'm not aware that ANY lab ANYWHERE looks at a slide for 30 minutes. The best test for Babesia screening and monitoring is Igenex's Babesia FISH test. The FISH test uses special fluorescent probes that bind to specific DNA (or RNA) in a sample. When objects in the sample glow under a fluorescent microscope, you can be sure you have a positive result.

VIEW IMAGE

Thanks, i am going to try to see if my LLMD knows someone, i would like to get a baseline stain done. maybe at some point i would get my own scope.

Tooty, i had babesia FISH and Bartonella FISH done at Igenex, both negative. at MDL, they were both IGG positive. maybe i could retry FISH at MDL.

i just feel more comfortable trying to track its progress with a real test, even if its somewhat suspect due to various reasons.

Thanks for your feedback.

I was tested with Igenex FISH tests before i started any type of treatment. When i tested with MDL i just started treatment, was on Ceftin only for about a week when all the lyme and coninfections tests were done. so, dont think its possible that the infection has been cleared. I dont have many babesia symptoms tho, mainly just low body temperature, cold hands and feet, mood/irritability. it made me question if it was a 'false positive', but believe that is unlikely as i have heard of a lot of people that don't exhibit symptoms

I would be willing to do 2 or 3 slides to see what the results are, i am going for an initial consultation at JSC at the end of the month, will request these. maybe look into a scope after that, i am scientific type, so woulnd't mind learning how to use it, tho i just want some results right now. would probably take me a bit to develop the expertise.

sierraDon, I just want to clarify that the Dr. J I'm referring to is the one in Rockville, Maryland. I'm not aware that J. Specialty Clinic does in-house smears. The Bart "guru," Dr. M, does in-house smears too, but they are $500 per slide!!!

Yeah Aerose91, it's pretty crazy isn't it? Most doctors are not allowed to do Giemsa smears because they don't have a certified in-house lab, so there are very few docs doing it. It's relegated to hospitals and commercial labs, and they almost never find these infections because the loads are really low unless it's at the onset of infection and you are running a fever. Even then, the amount of time they spend per sample makes it very unlikely they'll catch them.

I'm not a big fan of Dr. S in Florida, but he has published some helpful reference books regarding microscopic detection of these infections, mainly for Babesia.

It's very easy to do this yourself, once you get familiar with it.

In answer to your question Aerose91, a simple used brightfield lab-grade scope can easily be had on Ebay for about a $100. For $200-$500 you can get a really nice set-up for brightfield, darkfield, and phase contrast. But, I emphasize, you only need the cheaper brightfield scope to view a simple Giemsa smear. Darkfield and phase contrast are used for looking at wet or "live" samples.

You can still view spirochetes with plain brightfield (as long as you have 1000x), but it's more difficult. But 400x brightfield is not enough to do much of anything when it comes to blood, so it's important to get a scope with a 100x oil immersion objective lens. All lab-grade scopes should come with the 100x objective lens unless it's been removed for some reason.

I paid about $110 ($150 total with shipping) for my first (lab-grade) scope (used), and it was equipped for brightfield up to 1000x and dark phase contrast up to 450x. (A darkfield- or phase-contrast-equipped scope can easily view spirochetes at 400x).

But, I emphasize, a lab-grade BRIGHTFIELD microscope with 1000x is all you really need to get started. And, they are pretty cheap. The Giemsa stain I use I got as free samples from Astral Diagnostics. I got the Quick-1 "blue," and the Quick-1 "red." Getting some is as simple as calling and requesting a sample. Those are ready-to-use solutions. No fixative step needed. Very simple to make a stained smear once you learn the "sliding technique."

So Aerose91, to answer your question, the total price can easily be less than $200! No more than $100 if you get a good deal on a lab-grade scope and I've seen them go for as low as $100 with shipping on occasion!

And, no special photography equipment was needed for those pics. Believe it or not, I use my old Canon A540 (6mp) for my photomicrographs.

If you have a simple point and shoot camera, or even a phone camera, you can get pics just as good down through the eyepiece lens of the microscope!

In fact you can get universal adapters for microscopes to use with your camera or phone. They are about $20. But most of my pics are shot free-hand down through the eyepiece.

Tooty-

Thanks so much for that detailed explanation. It's impressive that you have gone to this step. Im seeing Dr M who did a blood smear for me and said he thought he saw protozoa but im interested in this now, to monitor my own path, as well as i think its really cool