Chronic Lyme Disease Symptoms

The chronic Lyme disease symptoms are commonly misdiagnosed, which can lead to various kinds of health problems. The Lyme disease is also known as LD, and this is a seriously complex multi-system inflammatory disease. The LD is triggered by the bacterial lipoproteins, which are produced by the spiral-shaped bacteria called Borrelia. These Borrelia are difficult to isolate and most of the times they grow, and are studied in the laboratory. There are chances that the transmission of Borrelia occurs primarily through the bite of ticks. Hence LD actually affects every tissue and every major organ system in the body.

Some of the various forms through which the disease appears include chronic joint pain, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, immune dysfunction and even neurological diseases. Diagnosis of Lyme disease has been based upon clinical evidence and at present there are no laboratory tests for the same. The complex clinical presentation of Lyme disease has led to misdiagnosis with other disorders like such as: Multiple Sclerosis, Lupus, Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, Rheumatoid Arthritis and many other diseases also.

Even though the Lyme disease has been familiar name to most people, their knowledge of this topic is very limited. Unfortunately, this is also true for most professionals in the medical community. Lyme disease is a very serious form of disease, and it should not be taken lightly. There are a lot of people who suffer from this disease but continue to be misdiagnosed and mistreated. Often the correct diagnosis doesn't occur until after several months of the person suffering with the disease.

By that time the disease has already caused severe illness, disability and permanent damage to the patient. Some of the common symptoms of the LD include neck stiffness. Usually these pains are severe and jumping from joint to another joint. Most of the times, these pains are there for shorter periods and there can also be pain in the teeth or in the temporal-mandibular joints. Apart from this, the pain in the ribs and chest occurs frequently and hence a number of people seek care in emergency rooms thinking of it as a cardiac disease.

Effects like numbness, burning, tingling, and itching are also there in LD. There are a lot of patients who experience crawling sensations in their bodies along with vibrations, or electric shock-like sensations. LD Is more of a neuro-sensory, rather than a motor, disease and hence needs the apt treatments. This disease is purely neurological and has symptoms and signs like headaches, aseptic meningitis, facial nerve and encephalitis or encephalopathy. These may also be manifested by cognitive dysfunction, which leads to short-term memory loss.

Some of the symptoms of LD include fevers, visual dysfunction, tinnitus, sensitivity to sounds, or hearing loss. There are other symptoms experienced here like the shortness of breath along with palpitations and abdominal pains. Some of the rarer symptoms may relate to panniculitis and hepatitis along with the congenital and other similar infections. In some of the worst cases multiple sclerosis can be part of Lyme disease and hence it is vital that the doctor is able to diagnose this problem correctly to give the right treatment.

• John Palsson
• 05/06/2009, 6:59 AM
• 0 Comments