Lyme borreliosis
what to do if you’re bitten by a tick ?
How to treat a tick bite?
What methods are effective in treating lyme disease?
Is Lyme disease 100% curable?
Lyme disease is caused by Borrelia bacteria spread to people by the bite of an infected blacklegged tick.
This disease is most common in the upper Midwest and the northeastern and mid-Atlantic states. It’s also common in Europe and in south central and southeastern Canada.
You’re at risk of Lyme disease if you spend time where the ticks live, such as grassy, brushy or wooded areas.
Luckily, practitioners of Chinese Medicine have some very effective methods that we can use to help patients cope with the side effects of Lyme.
An infectious disease transmitted by tick bite
Lyme disease is considered an autoimmune condition, which is an instance where the body’s immune system cannot determine the exact enemy, so it becomes confused and eventually begins to attack the individual’s body. This can manifest in a wide range of symptoms.
Symptoms of Lyme borreliosis depend on the stage of the disease.
Understanding lyme disease
Lyme disease and Acupuncture
Acupuncture can provide support for each individual constitution and promotes the body’s general capacity to heal itself. The stronger the body, the more able it is to defend itself from disease.
To treat chronic Lyme disease, we reduce inflammation, which facilitates the recovery of the immune system.
Chinese medicine always looks at the big picture, and the practitioner deals with the symptoms and how they present themselves that day.
Each and every individual is treated based on their unique symptoms which change as time progress. This is why no two treatments are exactly the same!
Lyme borreliosis is generally classified into three stages.
Early localized
It occurs 3 to 30 days after a tick bite. Lyme disease is characterized by a typical cutaneous manifestation.
Early disseminated
This disease occurs several days to several weeks after a tick bite and can manifest itself through symptoms such as :
- multiple erythema migrans
- neurological manifestations (such as facial paralysis, isolated meningitis, or acute myelitis)
- More rarely, articular manifestations (like arthritis with effusion of a large joint such as the knee), but also cutaneous manifestations, or even cardiac or ophthalmological manifestations.
Late disseminated
It arises several months or even years after the tick bite and is characterized by by symptoms such as:
- Articular
- Cutaneous
- Rarely, specific neurological manifestations.
GOOD TO KNOW
Another key point : Clinical manifestations of Lyme borreliosis in the early and late disseminated stages only appear in the absence of antibiotic treatment, particularly when early localized Lyme borreliosis has gone undetected.