Tuesday, January 6, 2009

Medical Update

Today I saw Dr. R. I've made little progress against this illness so far, and we discussed where to go from here. In treating chronic Lyme, there's a lot of variation in how aggressive you want to be. The more aggressive you are, the more likely you are to have severe die-off reactions and therefore feel miserable. But you're moving faster. Short-term pain for (hopeful) long-term gain.

It surely comes as no surprise to anyone who knows me that I want to be as aggressive as possible, within the limits of safety and our financial resources. With that in mind, we are moving from oral antibiotics for Bb (the Lyme bacteria) to intramuscular injections of bicillin. (Next step, if this doesn't work, is a PICC line for IV antibiotics. Much more expensive, and higher risk. And insurance companies often don't want to pay.)

We are also switching over to Levaquin for bartonella, and adding Flagyl to disrupt the cyst form of Bb. We are discontinuing the azithromyacin, bactrim, and ceftin. And we are adding a supplement called Lumbrokinase to treat possible biofilms and hypercoagulability, along with glutathione precursors to help with liver support/detox.

The breakdown of all of this is that Nick is going to be giving me shots in my butt three times a week. And then my butt will hurt for two days. At which point I get my next shot. I am going to be totally butthurt. At least I'm not afraid of needles.

The schedule for all of this is as follows:

Today: Stop azithromyacin and bactrim. Start Flagyl and new supplements.
One week out: Have first bicillin injection. Stop Ceftin.
Three weeks out: Begin Levaquin.

We're spacing out the changes so we can monitor my response to each.

So the updated med list is: Bicillin injections, Flagyl, Levaquin, sertraline, nystatin, levothyroxine, clonazapam, vicodin (as needed for pain), Astelin allergy nasal spray, birth control pills, multi-vitamins, amino acid supplement, B12, omega-3s, vitamin C, vitamin D, acetyl-l-carnitine, ashwagandha, Fibroboost, quercetin, Lumbrokinase, glutathione precursors, d-ribose, and probiotics.

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