scholarly journals Induced Native Phage Therapy for the Treatment of Lyme Disease and Relapsing Fever: A Retrospective Review of First 14 Months in One Clinic

Cureus ◽  
2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
David A Jernigan ◽  
Martin C Hart ◽  
Keeley K Dodd ◽  
Samuel Jameson ◽  
Todd Farney
2018 ◽  
Vol 130 (15-16) ◽  
pp. 484-490 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sven Bergström ◽  
Johan Normark
Keyword(s):  

2000 ◽  
Vol 68 (7) ◽  
pp. 3900-3908 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Stevenson ◽  
Stephen F. Porcella ◽  
Katrina L. Oie ◽  
Cecily A. Fitzpatrick ◽  
Sandra J. Raffel ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Borrelia hermsii, an agent of tick-borne relapsing fever, was found to contain multiple circular plasmids approximately 30 kb in size. Sequencing of a DNA library constructed from circular plasmid fragments enabled assembly of a composite DNA sequence that is homologous to the cp32 plasmid family of the Lyme disease spirochete,B. burgdorferi. Analysis of another relapsing fever bacterium, B. parkeri, indicated that it contains linear homologs of the B. hermsii and B. burgdorfericp32 plasmids. The B. hermsii cp32 plasmids encode homologs of the B. burgdorferi Mlp and Bdr antigenic proteins and BlyA/BlyB putative hemolysins, but homologs of B. burgdorferi erp genes were absent. Immunoblot analyses demonstrated that relapsing fever patients produced antibodies to Mlp proteins, indicating that those proteins are synthesized by the spirochetes during human infection. Conservation of cp32-encoded genes in differentBorrelia species suggests that their protein products serve functions essential to both relapsing fever and Lyme disease spirochetes. Relapsing fever borreliae replicate to high levels in the blood of infected animals, permitting direct detection and possible functional studies of Mlp, Bdr, BlyA/BlyB, and other cp32-encoded proteins in vivo.


2019 ◽  
Vol 57 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Sam R. Telford ◽  
Heidi K. Goethert ◽  
Philip J. Molloy ◽  
Victor Berardi

ABSTRACTBorrelia miyamotoidisease (BMD) is a newly recognized borreliosis that is cotransmitted by ticks wherever Lyme disease is zoonotic. UnlikeBorrelia burgdorferisensu lato, the agent of Lyme disease,B. miyamotoiis closely related to relapsing fever spirochetes, such asBorrelia hermsii. Some authors have suggested that the disease caused byB. miyamotoishould be considered a hard-tick-transmitted relapsing fever, and thus, the main mode of confirming a diagnosis for that infection, microscopy to analyze a blood smear, may have clinical utility. To determine whether blood smears may detectB. miyamotoiin the blood of acute BMD patients, we made standard malariological thick smears from anticoagulated blood samples that were previously determined to contain this agent (by PCR) and analyzed them for morphological evidence of spirochetes. Spirochetes were not detected in the blood smears from 20 PCR positive patient blood samples after examination of 100 thick smear fields and only 2 of 20 demonstrated spirochetes when the examination was extended to 300 thick smear fields. Inoculation of severe combined immunodeficient (SCID) mice yielded isolates from 5 of 5 samples, but 0 of 3 BALB/c mice became infected. We conclude that in strong contrast to the diagnosis of typical relapsing fever, microscopy of blood smears is not sensitive enough for confirming a diagnosis of BMD but that SCID mouse inoculation could be a useful complement to PCR.


2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Florian Binetruy ◽  
Stéphane Garnier ◽  
Nathalie Boulanger ◽  
Émilie Talagrand-Reboul ◽  
Etienne Loire ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  

Antibiotics ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 9 (12) ◽  
pp. 868
Author(s):  
Jiachen Gao ◽  
Zhaodi Gong ◽  
Dawn Montesano ◽  
Erica Glazer ◽  
Kenneth Liegner

A total of 71 patients with Lyme disease were identified for analysis in whom treatment with disulfiram was initiated between 15 March 2017 and 15 March 2020. Four patients were lost to follow-up, leaving 67 evaluable patients. Our retrospective review found patients to fall into a “high-dose” group (≥4 mg/kg/day) and a “low-dose” group (<4 mg/kg/day). In total, 62 of 67 (92.5%) patients treated with disulfiram were able to endorse a net benefit of the treatment with regard to their symptoms. Moreover, 12 of 33 (36.4%) patients who completed one or two courses of “high-dose” therapy enjoyed an “enduring remission”, defined as remaining clinically well for ≥6 months without further anti-infective treatment. The most common adverse reactions from disulfiram treatment in the high-dose group were fatigue (66.7%), psychiatric symptoms (48.5%), peripheral neuropathy (27.3%), and mild to moderate elevation of liver enzymes (15.2%). We observed that although patients on high dose experienced a higher risk for adverse reactions than those on a low dose, high-dose patients were significantly more likely to achieve enduring remission.


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