Jemsek Provider Update

From Facebook

Carry Hodges went to Alabama.

[email protected]
Carrye's MedRenew Clinic opens next week. You may email her at the above address for appointments. Her phone extension goes live next week, and Linda looks forward to scheduling your appointment.
MedRenew's focus will be TBD. She will see patients 14 years and up and case by case for younger patients.
Carrye is collaborating with top notch infectious and chronic disease specialists. The larger MedHelpClinic has primary care physicians, gynocology, and a long-covid specialist. The clinic also has a lab and ultrasound onsite.
Prices - $775 for a 2-hour appt to establish at MedRenew after JSC. Must have had an appt at JSC with the past 14 months.
$965 new patient - 2.5 hrs appt.
$590 - 1.5 hr for second appt **just for new patients** Also will apply if pt has not been seen at MedRenew for over 14 months from establishing.
$430 follow up appts onsite - 45 min.
International patients need a yearly onsite appt and will be able to phone consult other appts.
Carrye's treatment plan has some components of Long-Covid, but patients with Long-Covid may schedule separately with Dr. Vaughn at MedHelpClinics.

Post from Facebook about Rachel and Danielle:

I just learned Rachel Markey and Danielle from JSC found an MD to set up a practice with and are just waiting for office space in the same DC building. There will be an official announcement in the next couple weeks. Rachel hopes to start seeing patients end of June or in July. I got this from Rachel. Not a rumor, will happen, but timing is not solid.

Candace went back to NC. I dont know what she is doing.

I also would like to know about DrJ.
Obviously he won’t be back doctoring.
So sad.

trkane said...
From Facebook

Carry Hodges went to Alabama.

[email protected]
Carrye's MedRenew Clinic opens next week. You may email her at the above address for appointments. Her phone extension goes live next week, and Linda looks forward to scheduling your appointment.
MedRenew's focus will be TBD. She will see patients 14 years and up and case by case for younger patients.
Carrye is collaborating with top notch infectious and chronic disease specialists. The larger MedHelpClinic has primary care physicians, gynocology, and a long-covid specialist. The clinic also has a lab and ultrasound onsite.
Prices - $775 for a 2-hour appt to establish at MedRenew after JSC. Must have had an appt at JSC with the past 14 months.
$965 new patient - 2.5 hrs appt.
$590 - 1.5 hr for second appt **just for new patients** Also will apply if pt has not been seen at MedRenew for over 14 months from establishing.
$430 follow up appts onsite - 45 min.
International patients need a yearly onsite appt and will be able to phone consult other appts.
Carrye's treatment plan has some components of Long-Covid, but patients with Long-Covid may schedule separately with Dr. Vaughn at MedHelpClinics.

Post from Facebook about Rachel and Danielle:

I just learned Rachel Markey and Danielle from JSC found an MD to set up a practice with and are just waiting for office space in the same DC building. There will be an official announcement in the next couple weeks. Rachel hopes to start seeing patients end of June or in July. I got this from Rachel. Not a rumor, will happen, but timing is not solid.

Candace went back to NC. I dont know what she is doing.

Thanks for the update.

I'm confused about Rachel and Danielle. Are they trying to get the same office space Jemsek had or are they trying to secure a new office space in the same building as the old Jemsek office?

It'll be super fascinating to me who they get as a MD to supervise the practice. Will it be one of the big names in the Lyme world or perhaps a lesser known doctor?

I heard they had attempted have another doctor take over Jemsek's practice but it didn't work out so they're now starting the new practice hopefully in the same building.

Wow- that is good to hear!

I wonder if he is the MD Rachel found to open a new clinic.

yep - while its good news a prominent LLMD is going to be back in business

there are some mysterious circumstances that have not ben addressed

why did most / all of his staff resign on day 1 of whatever happened ?
and
why - when Dr J says it was just a minor - non-life-threatening health issue - while his 100's or 1000's of patients were suffering severe health issues themselves and desperate for news - was there radio silence for months?

i am happy to see he is back - but cant help being curious about what has been going on that has so far gone unexplained

we seem to be losing all the oldest and most trusted LLMD's - and its hard to see with clarity who the credible next generation are.

i think
Burrascano retired from being an LLMD some years ago - think he works behind the scene for Igenex
did the other Dr J passed away recently
Dr H is i think past retirement age
i think i heard Dr MR retired from clinical practice

a part of me feels people like Dr J and Dr H would make a bigger contribution overall if they set up some kind of LLMD training hub to teach the next generation full time, in their final years - as they will otherwise leave a void when then retire / pass away

Speculating of course, but, I can't help but wonder if those that worked under him saw how precarious their employment situations were if their jobs depended on a 74 year old man's health. They would be right, IMO, to be freaked out about stable employment going forward.

Regardless, there are lots of unanswered questions. Being as old as he is, if he wants his practice to continue beyond his incapacitation or death, he really needs to bring on another MD to take over when that happens.

Glad to hear some news, although I agree with the others’ comments how there are still many unanswered questions and oddities.

Regarding the older LLMD’s need to have successors, I can imagine some reasons why that hasn’t happened. It’s entirely possible that they attempted to something in the past, and it didn’t play out the way we would have liked.

Here’s some hurdles I can think of:
1. Knowing that he was run out of another state, terribly persecuted, and paid a high personal cost to continue caring for patients that no one else wanted to help.
- It would take a special kind of MD to knowingly risk all that.
- Some doctors may have harbored lingering doubts regarding him and his methods due to the actions taken against him.
2. Young doctors (who ideally would be the most obvious ones to train as successors) likely have massive debt and are more interested in making money rather than making a difference.
3. The smartest and most talented are more likely to desire pioneering their own way rather than carrying on someone else’s traditions.

All that said, it does seem we are on the verge of a crisis in terms of LLMD’s. Dr. M, the bartonella guru, is another one. I believe he stopped practicing clinically a few years ago. He’s not young either. I will pray about this.

Post Edited (WalkingbyFaith) : 5/26/2024 6:53:26 PM (GMT-8)

Some good points about the reasons driving a lack of up-and-coming LLMD's there from WBF

i would say it takes a certain sort of person to take it on as a profession -

in the past most of them seem to be rather unconventional people in some sense -
some are very independent thinkers - like i believe Dr J is - Dr SP, and Burrascano also - all very bright and deeply inquisitive - and very focussed figuring things out for themselves - questioning of received wisdom

they also need to be willing to take risks - eg with their career path
most doctors in clinical practice are not like that at all in my experience
the vast majority are followers of flow charts developed by others - conformist and risk averse.
they are much more in the camp of "i have taken 7 years to qualify for this profession - and now i have a job for life - so the last thing i am going to do is to put that at risk for one patient"
so that cuts the field down to a few percent of qualified MD's being both capable intellectually and willing.

in the past few decades where the lyme denial and controversy was higher - and therefore the risks greater - it was particularly difficult make a living as an LLMD

i see that last part as gradually changing for the better now - at lest in the USA -
( Europe and the UK is lagging behind )

i also see the greater recognition of chronic illness in general in the population as a whole -
in the UK the growing % of people who are classified as "economically inactive" is quoted as the main cause for the UK's falling GDP relative to our neighbours - most of these people are simply too sick to work. so the level of chronic illness has now grown to such an extent that its impacting national and global economies.

my personal belief is that inside this general chronic disease epidemic is lurking an epidemic of arthropod born illness.
of course not all all chronically ill people have lyme or bart - but it wouldn't surprise me if a significant percentage do - maybe 5 or 10 or maybe even 15% of them could have it in the picture. it may not be the thing that made them ill in the first place, but we know lyme and co are all opportunistic infections - and take advantage of hosts when their systems are compromised.
so people with things like type 2 diabetes/metabolic syndrome, auto-immune disease, MS, Alzheimer's or other dementias, mental health conditions, and certainly things like CFS and Fibromyalgia may well, in many cases, have illnesses caused in part or in full by a chronic infection like lyme or bart.

so as we see a dramatic increase in the incidence of chronic disease in the population as a whole - i believe this will be reflected in a greater incidence of lyme in that more sick population

you could argue we are seeing this already - at this point OVER HALF of the adult US population now has one or more diagnosed chronic diseases, a dramatic increase in recent decades - and over the same few decades the official incidence of lyme has gone from around 30,000 cases per year to around 450,000 cases per year - a 15 fold increase.

so i think demand for support for this condition will grow rapidly over the coming decade. if people cannot get to see a qualified LLMD they will be forced to look elsewhere.

Dr J did once show slides and talk about a plan to build a centre of excellence for treating Lyme and training practitioners in his methods - it was some time ago - and i think was curtailed by the legal case brought against him that absorbed time and funds.

in my view its too large a venture for one LLMD and his private funds - but would be an ideal project for an organisation like ILADS - who could take on the challenge of developing a standardised model of the disease, coordinating research to fill gaps in knowledge, and training LLMD's in a Standard of Care for the condition.
this would be way more impactful than their current activity of holding a few conferences

just my musings on the topic this morning ...