Researchers seek help for advanced Lyme disease
By Will Dunham
Intravenous antibiotics can help people with symptoms of advanced Lyme disease, but some of these improvements end once the drug is stopped, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.
There has been controversy over how to treat people with the tick-borne bacterial disease, in particular whether extended antibiotic treatment fights symptoms that remain after standard initial antibiotics.
The Lyme disease bacterium is spread to people by the bite of infected ticks. Symptoms can include fever, headache, fatigue and a round red skin rash. If left untreated, the infection can spread to joints, the heart and brain.
The disease also can cause cognitive problems like memory loss, problems in concentrating, and changes in mood and sleeping habits, as well as temporary facial paralysis.
The new research, published in the journal Neurology, provided a mixed picture of extended intravenous treatment with antibiotics.
The researchers screened 3,368 Lyme disease patients to select 37 with moderate cognitive impairment and significant levels of fatigue, pain and impaired physical functioning. All previously had taken antibiotics.
Some of the patients were given another 10 weeks of intravenous treatment with the antibiotic ceftriaxone. The others were given a placebo.
Those getting the antibiotic had improvements in their symptoms compared to the placebo group, the study found, but the improvement in cognitive symptoms dissipated after the treatment ended.
A boost in physical functioning and reduced pain were seen particularly among patients given ceftriaxone who had entered the study with the most severe symptoms, and these benefits endured after the drug treatment stopped.
This suggests that ceftriaxone may provide short-term and long-term benefits for these symptoms, the researchers said, adding that future studies should examine how to make the overall improvements more enduring.
Most people who develop Lyme disease can be treated successfully with a few weeks of antibiotics.
"Unfortunately, for those patients who have cognitive problems, their options aren't that many in terms of what treatments might be helpful for them," Dr. Brian Fallon, director of the Lyme and Tick-borne Disease Research Center at Columbia University Medical Center in New York who led the study, said in a telephone interview.
The researchers said about a quarter of the patients given the intravenous antibiotic experienced serious side effects, illustrating that such treatment has risks.
By Will Dunham
Intravenous antibiotics can help people with symptoms of advanced Lyme disease, but some of these improvements end once the drug is stopped, U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.
There has been controversy over how to treat people with the tick-borne bacterial disease, in particular whether extended antibiotic treatment fights symptoms that remain after standard initial antibiotics.
The Lyme disease bacterium is spread to people by the bite of infected ticks. Symptoms can include fever, headache, fatigue and a round red skin rash. If left untreated, the infection can spread to joints, the heart and brain.
The disease also can cause cognitive problems like memory loss, problems in concentrating, and changes in mood and sleeping habits, as well as temporary facial paralysis.
The new research, published in the journal Neurology, provided a mixed picture of extended intravenous treatment with antibiotics.
The researchers screened 3,368 Lyme disease patients to select 37 with moderate cognitive impairment and significant levels of fatigue, pain and impaired physical functioning. All previously had taken antibiotics.
Some of the patients were given another 10 weeks of intravenous treatment with the antibiotic ceftriaxone. The others were given a placebo.
Those getting the antibiotic had improvements in their symptoms compared to the placebo group, the study found, but the improvement in cognitive symptoms dissipated after the treatment ended.
A boost in physical functioning and reduced pain were seen particularly among patients given ceftriaxone who had entered the study with the most severe symptoms, and these benefits endured after the drug treatment stopped.
This suggests that ceftriaxone may provide short-term and long-term benefits for these symptoms, the researchers said, adding that future studies should examine how to make the overall improvements more enduring.
Most people who develop Lyme disease can be treated successfully with a few weeks of antibiotics.
"Unfortunately, for those patients who have cognitive problems, their options aren't that many in terms of what treatments might be helpful for them," Dr. Brian Fallon, director of the Lyme and Tick-borne Disease Research Center at Columbia University Medical Center in New York who led the study, said in a telephone interview.
The researchers said about a quarter of the patients given the intravenous antibiotic experienced serious side effects, illustrating that such treatment has risks.
