CAUTION!! May be upsetting for some to read!! From a very well known Pediatric LLMD:
www.lymepa.org/Corson_2004_0424_Slides_Handouts.pdf"Signs and Symptoms
• Pre-schoolers and toddlers
– Mood swings, sudden emotional outbursts
– Irritability
– Personality changes
– Regression of motor and social skills
(developmental milestones)
– Changes in play behavior, tire easily, less
active
– Trouble falling asleep, frequent awakenings
– Nightmares, new phobias, recurrence of
separation anxiety
– Diaper rash unresponsive to normal treatment
– Frequent URIs, ear and throat infections,
bronchitis, pneumonia
Congenital Lyme disease
• Infants can be infected with Borrelia
transplacentally in any stage of pregnancy
and/or via mother’s breast milk.
• The co-infections: Babesia, Bartonella,
Mycoplasma and perhaps even the
Ehrlichias can be transmitted
transplacentally to the developing fetus.
Gestational Borreliosis can be associated
with repeated miscarriages, fetal death in
utero, fetal death at term (stillbirths),
hydrocephalus, cardiovascular anomalies,
intrauterine growth retardation, neonatal
respiratory distress, “sepsis” and death,
neonatal hyperbilirubinemia, cortical
blindness, sudden infant death syndrome
and maternal toxemia of pregnancy.
Borrelia spirochetes have been found at autopsy
in fetal brain, liver, adrenal glands, spleen, bone
marrow, heart and placenta
– None of the infected tissues showed any sign of
inflammation.
Infants either infected congenitally or from
breast milk can have
– Floppiness with poor muscle tone
– Irritability
– Frequent fevers and illness early in life
– Joint sensitivities and body pain
– Skin sensitivity
– Gastro esophageal reflux
– Developmental delays
– Learning disabilities and psychiatric problems
Infants infected congenitally can have
– Small windpipes (tracheomalacia)
– Eye problems (cataracts)
– Heart defects
• Infants bitten very early in life will have
many of the same symptoms
– loss and decline in developmental milestones.
Co-Infections
•
Bartonella henselae
: abdominal pain,
headache, visual problems, significant lymph
node enlargement (e.g. mesenteric adenitis),
rashes, unusual “stretch marks”, resistant
neurological deficits, new onset seizure disorder,
acute encephalitis
•
Babesia microti
(and other species): malarial
like illness inside red blood cells with intermittent
fevers, chills, day and night sweats, abdominal
pain, profound fatigue.
Ehrlichiosis
: high fevers, headaches,
muscle pains, flu-like symptoms. Labs
can show low WBC, platelets and
increased liver enzymes
•
Mycoplasma sp
.: fatigue, abdominal pain
•
Viruses
: abdominal pain, mouth sores.
Co-Infections are the rule, not the exception
• Co-Infections are often best diagnosed clinically
• Co-Infected patients are:
– sicker
– more likely to have failed prior treatment
– require longer treatment with multiple agents
• Co-Infections must be eradicated or Borrelia
infection will persist.