maybe I'm dense, but still don't understand Lymes Disease - Page 1

As some of you may recall, my male was diagnosed and treated for Lymes Disease earlier this year. How do I know for sure if the disease has gone into remission? The vet says there is no such test, as he will still show positive for Lymes for at least the next 3 years. But wouldn't a blood panel at least give me a little peace of mind that the disease isn't still eating away at his vital organs? The vet also said he needed a Lymes shot and booster (which he got) but that makes no sense to me either as he already has the disease. You guys got me worried and don't want to lose Trigger any sooner that I have to.

You don't want the symptoms of Lyme to present, so do what the vet says. No symptoms, no worry. Think of it like the difference between testing positive for HIV and having full blown AIDS.nbsp

I feel your pain! Living in a Lyme (no -s) disease part of the country we struggle with this all the time. Our dogs are herding dogs and are in tick infested terrain, and despite tick preventatives and Zodiac spray, one or the other will get an attached tick. You know how their coats are. Finding a tick isn't always easy despite nightly tick checks, and by the time we do find one, it's fat and has definitely been on for longer than 48 hours.

It takes approximately 48 hours for a tick to swap enough spit to contaminate a dog. If the tick did carry the bacterium which causes Lyme disease (Borellia burgdorferi) s/he does not necessarily have to develop an active infection. 95% of seropositive dogs remain asymptomatic.

The primary test for Lyme disease is the Snap 3DX which is used to test for heartworm antigens but also reveals th C6 antigen peptide which is highly specific for B. burgdorferi. Not all dogs with a positive Snap test will develop the disease, some are naturally resistant or genetically not disposed to get it. A dog may have been exposed to the Lyme disease causing agent but never develop symptoms or get the disease but he will always test positive on the Snap test, as will dogs who've been immunized.

There are other tests, ELISA and Western Blot.

ELISA is very sensitive to antibodies produced against Borellia whole cell antigen. It does not differentiate between natural exposure, i.e. antigen produced to Lyme infection vs Lyme vaccination and will be positive in both instances. It's used to screen for Lyme infection in dogs that were definitely not vaccinated and/or check for vaccination status in dogs that were definitely not exposed.

The Western Blot test recognizes the antibodies produced by exposure as well as those resulting from vaccination. It is specific and expensive. My vet charges $82 for a Western Blot but when it comes back negative, I'm assured my dog doesn't have Lyme disease because we do not vaccinate against it. The vaccine is, at this time, not reliable enough to protect them and, similar to the kennel cough vaccine, has to be repeated every 6 months.

When I find an engorged tick on a dog, meaning it's been on for some days, I put that dog on 28 days of Doxycycline. We have never had an active case of Lyme disease in this house, knock on wood. All our dogs test positive with the Snap 3DX because all of them have been naturally exposed but none of them developed the disease.

Hope this helps.

Aqua, you've helped a lot. Trigger recently got the vaccine, so not much I can do now except watch for symptoms. He's better than he was but still not back to normal. But then he may never be. I'll look into having him tested next year when the vaccine has a chance to clear out of his system.

Thanks!

Aqua presents good information above. However, some research suggests that a 12 hour attachment is sufficient to pass on the microbe. The issue is when are enough organisms passed through into the dog and apparently there is some research that suggests 12 hours is enough time. So to be conservative, I would go with that time frame.

The question you did not give information about is whether the dog shows signs still of having the disease. If it does, then it would be prudent to put the dog back on antibiotics. Sometimes it takes several months of being treated before the treatment is effective. And sometimes the treatment appears to have been effective, but the signs of disease come back. Lyme disease can be very, very stubborn and many people and dogs do not do well with a single course of treatment.nbsp

If I had a dog who had a bona-fide case, I would be certain that I had a vet I trusted, who was on top of all the latest tests and medication choices, and I would follow their advice.

The best test to find out if your dog has an ACTIVE INFECTION is called a LYME C-6 TEST.  Unlike the Lyme SNAP test, which just tests to see if lyme disease is present, the C6 Quantative Test actually measures the number of spyrochetes (sp?) in the dogs systems.  The measure I believe is 30 or below... if your dog measures 30+, treatment should be active/continuous/monitored.  If below 30 treatment may only be done again with Doxycycline if your dog is showing Clinical symptoms (ie., limping intermitantly, low grade fever, lethargicness, etc).

Just a note... even though your dog is Already Positive... HE CAN BE RE-INFECTED from another tick.. so PREVENTION is the best protection from Lyme.  USE THE VACCINE.. it DOES WORK.  I have lost one dog to Lyme Disease, have one who currently has Lyme, and one other that has been vaccinated and tested every year and has never come up positive.  In CONJUCTION with using the vaccine, you should also use a good, proven tick prevention such as Advantix or Frontline.

Hope that helps.

Amy

Trigger was treated once for 28 days with Doxycycline. His PLT count came back up and he's doing better, but still limps and doesn't have the energy he had before. So I am worried the infection could still be active. I will have to find a vet that will take things seriously and give me some peace of mind. I really appreciate the info as it will help to insure the vet is up on the latest treatments. Can't wait until it's too late. Thanks everyone.....i'm going to make a copy of this thread.

There is ALWAYS the possibility that LYME is NOT the only disease he has picked up.... though Erhlicia & Anaplasmosis would have shown up on the snap test (IF YOU VET USES THE NEW 4DX...not the 3Dx test... which only does Erhlicia, Lyme, HW)... there is the possibility he may have contracted Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever as well... just a thought.   But definately as about the Quantative Lyme C6 test.

I'd just like to add that you should be sure your vet is up to date on Lyme disease. I have a human friend who has Lyme. He tested positive and had symptoms about 10 years ago. He had a 3 month course of doxycycline at the time and it seemed to go away.  About 8 years later, he came down with it again with NO more tick bites. The spirochete can apparently survive that long while the patient is asymptomatic. His doctor repeated the course of doxycycline. His symptoms have never gone away. HIs current Lyme specialist says he should have been treated with a different antibiotic (other than doxycycline) for the repeat course of antibiotics when Lyme recurred. I don't know if this has been researched in dogs or not, but they may react in a similar manner to humans. It's something to keep in mind for the future.

All my dogs have been vaccinated for Lyme and will test positive because of that.  Last year dogs on my SAR team started getting ill and started coming up positive for rockey mountain spotted fever.  We were advised to put them on Doxy, have their titers re-checked and didn't stop the Doxy until their titers were below 100 and no symptoms.  The Vet said one of the biggest mistakes if removing the antibiotics before it has done it's job completely otherwise it can come back with worse.  We drew the dogs blood ourselves and took it to a state lab for testing, which only cost $15.00.  It was a lot cheaper than doing it through the Vet each time.  We had a few dogs with titers at 1600, so they were on Doxy for over 3 months.  

I'm not sure about giving a dog they Lyme vaccine after they've contracted the disease but I know the vaccine is two parts and a month from each other.  I believe it was NC State University that has been doing tick borne disease studies and a wealth of information.  Many Vets just don't have a lot of knowledge about them.  We were told they had more cases last summer than they'd ever had before.  We all use different Vets so that is very scary. 

Teri