Full Transcript Podcast Introduction 0:00 I think one of the biggest problems with chronic Lyme patients and why they come to us so late is that their initial labs look great. 0:10 Their early Lyme tests or ELISA tests or very superficial peripheral Lyme tests, if they'd even have them, they're negative. 0:19 And so don't give up and don't be told that this is all in your head. 0:29 Because the answers are out there. 0:30 There's so many amazing practitioners and there's so many treatment approaches and modalities that can work. 0:39 for you and don't settle. 0:41 Don't settle for just getting a little bit better because there's no reason why almost everybody can't get well and fully recovered. 0:52 Hi, and welcome to the Lime Bites podcast, where we shine a light on the misunderstood science of Lyme and other vector borne diseases, 1:00 as well as the truths that many still miss. 1:04 I'm Dr. 1:04 Mariah Hinchey, naturopathic physician and fellow of the Medical Academy of Pediatric Special Needs. 1:10 I specialize in treating chronic Lyme disease, as well as other complex inflammatory conditions. 1:17 In this podcast, we break down what's working and what's not. 1:21 We share the facts that most people miss, we challenge outdated thinking, and we give both patients and practitioners the tools to heal smarter. 1:30 So let's get into it and change the way we heal Lyme.
Acute Lyme Treatment Timing 1:37 Hi, and welcome to another episode. 1:39 I'm your host, Dr. 1:40 Mariah Hinchy. 1:41 And today we're going to be talking about effective treatments for Lyme disease. 1:44 I am so passionate about this topic because there's just so much false information out there regarding the treatment of Lyme disease. 1:53 And it's not just chronic Lyme disease. 1:56 It is surprising how many medical professionals out there are treating acute Lyme disease inappropriately. 2:03 And as you can imagine, this leads to a lot more cases of chronic Lyme disease. 2:09 So here to navigate this often controversial topic with me is Stephen Harris, MD. 2:15 And Dr. 2:16 Harris's father, Nick Harris, actually founded Igenics Labs, which is the gold standard lab for tick-borne disease testing. 2:26 And Dr. 2:26 Harris actually grew up since a teenager being basically immersed in the world of Lyme disease. 2:34 So without further ado, I'd like to introduce Dr. 2:38 Stephen Harris, and we're going to jump right into questions because we have so much to talk about. 2:44 So welcome, Dr. 2:45 Harris. 2:46 Thanks for having me. 2:48 Absolutely. 2:49 All right. 2:49 So what would be the primary modalities used to treat Lyme disease? 2:55 Well, Lyme disease is an infection. 3:00 So the primary modalities that one thinks about are anti-infectives. 3:05 Now, when we think of Lyme disease, we think of Borrelia burgdorferi, that's the spirochete that causes Lyme, but there's also the wider topic of the co-infections. 3:15 So sometimes when I'm talking just for the rest of this talk, I may be talking about Borrelia, I also may be talking about co-infections as well. 3:24 But Lyme disease is an infection and anti-infectives are the way to treat infections. 3:30 Okay, so let's start with some basic guidelines regarding antibiotics. 3:34 If you have an acute case of Lyme disease, what is the antibiotic of choice? 3:40 What is the minimum duration that you feel a patient should be treated? 3:45 And is there a specific window of time in which antibiotics are most effective, like that they need to be started with them? 3:54 So in acute Lyme, when the tick is feeding on the host, Borrelia, gets transmitted and disseminates very rapidly through our bloodstream into our tissues, 4:07 even into nervous tissue very rapidly.
Chronic Lyme Antibiotic Strategies 4:10 So the quicker that one can get on antimicrobials, antibiotics, the more chance they're going to have of completely eradicating this so it doesn't become 4:19 a chronic infection. 4:21 Now, within a day, two days, three days is optimal, but really within two weeks of the initial infection, one really needs to be treated. 4:31 And if you're treated in that window, it's more than likely, at least 70% likely that with proper treatment, high enough doses, 4:41 long enough treatment, that you're going to prevent these infections from becoming chronic. 4:47 Many times it's interesting that you don't even need to treat the co-infections if you can treat Lyme disease early enough because your immune system will 4:54 be able to prevent those from actually hanging on. 4:57 Interesting. 4:59 So is it 14 days, 21 days, 30 days? 5:03 Like, is there a minimum that you would recommend or you would treat your own patients with, again, with an acute tick bite saying that you got them on 5:12 the proper antibiotic within the first 48 to 72 hours? 5:17 So if there's a confirmed Lyme, whether the tick comes back positive, if the tick's been tested, or if someone has early manifestations such as a bullseye rash, 5:32 or has PCR positivity because you're not going to get an immune response, an IgM immune response for at least three weeks. 5:39 So if you know that you're dealing with an acute case of Lyme, I'm going to treat those patients for six weeks. 5:46 or until symptoms are gone. 5:49 Now I'd see the very minimum that I would treat them. 5:52 If there were other reasons that people have very sensitive gastrointestinal tracts, if they have mast cell issues already, 5:59 if they have other confounding infections or other things going on that prevents them from taking full doses of antibiotics, 6:05 I'll go as low as two weeks. 6:07 But two weeks, I start getting nervous. 6:10 Three weeks is better. 6:11 Six weeks is optimal for acute Lyme. 6:16 And so six weeks is, I believe, is optimal. 6:20 Okay, great. 6:22 And what about for chronic Lyme disease? 6:26 Are there a certain combination and or minimum duration? 6:30 I mean, obviously, you know, people who have been treated for years and decades, right? 6:34 But I mean, what would be the minimum amount of time that you would imagine somebody with chronic Lyme disease to need to be treated for and with what? 6:44 Unfortunately, the database doesn't give us great guidelines here. 6:49 There's no hard and fast rules on how long someone needs to be treated. 6:53 The strategy that's worked the absolute best actually comes from Joe Berascano, showed through lots of display that Two months past the resolution of symptoms 7:06 and the absence of positive tests suggesting active infection is how long one should treat. 7:12 And so these treatments can be open-ended. 7:14 Sometimes these treatments can go on for years. 7:18 The, uh, we don't like them to go on for years and if Dapsone and some of these other treatments that, that are coming down the pike. 7:26 turn out to really fit, then hopefully we won't have to treat patients for so long. 7:31 But in chronic Borreliosis and chronic persistent Borreliosis, it's important to cover all of the different manifestations of this organism. 7:41 So at least with Borrelia, and I'm not talking about the co-infections because I usually treat the co-infections first. 7:48 Sometimes I'll treat, well, in a perfect world, I treat Babesiosis first when patients have them. 7:52 I'll treat the Bartonella first if the Bartonella symptoms are predominant. 7:57 And I think someone else will probably be speaking about the symptoms of Bartonella versus Babesia, but I'll treat those first. 8:04 But when I'm actually treating Borrelia infections. 8:08 I want to work on the spiral and an antispiral drug, which would typically be what's considered a cell wall drug, a wall drug such as high dose amoxicillin 8:18 or penicillin, or a medium dose, higher generation cephalosporin, cephreroxime, or ceftanil or cefixime, or some of the other drugs that are used non-orally 8:31 or parenterally. 8:34 So I'll use one of those drugs. 8:35 Those work when the spirochete is dividing and they work outside of our cells in the bloodstream in the central nervous system. 8:45 In addition, we know that these organisms can live inside of many of our cells, whether it's in fibroblasts, or in other tissue cells such as liver cells 8:55 or in bladder cells. 8:57 And so we also need to use drugs that actually get into those cells. 9:00 And so I'll use what are called ribosomal inhibitors. 9:04 And so that would either be the macrolides like zithromycin, commonly called zithromax or clarithromycin, biaxin, or another drug like that, 9:12 which are the tetracycline drugs, tetracycline, doxycycline, minocycline, omidicycline, or one of these drugs.
Multidisciplinary Care and Herbal Support 9:20 Many times I'll use one cell wall drug such as Omniceph, which is ceftanir, third generation cephalosporin, and an intracellular like azithromycin or clarithromycin. 9:31 And I'll use a drug that works on the cell wall deficient forms. 9:36 There's been a lot of evidence about this. 9:38 Uh, they're called cyst forms or Lister forms. 9:41 There's a lot of different names for them, but basically they're these organisms that have, that have lost their cell wall temporarily and are one of the 9:49 reasons we think that there's persisting. 9:51 Those drugs would be tinnitusol, metronidazole, or likely nitrozoxanide. 9:56 Nitrozoxanide being the easiest one to tolerate, but maybe the least effective in that. 10:00 So I'll usually have people on three drugs when I'm treating Borrelia infections. 10:06 Occasionally I'll use a double intracellular approach where I'll use azithromycin and minocycline or clarithromycin and oxycycline because they're working 10:18 on two different parts of the ribosome. 10:20 Often double intracellulars is a really effective way to go. 10:23 Ritorowicz really popularized that approach and it's still quite effective. 10:28 Usually use combinations that cover all the different phases, the different locations where you're going to find it. 10:35 And then we have to also think about aspects. 10:38 What other ways can the organism hide? 10:40 What other strategies do we need to consider? 10:43 Dr. 10:43 Phillips talked about blebs in his wonderful book, and it's a real important reason for persistence. 10:51 We also now know about biofilms, so we have to deal with biofilms. 10:55 Those are basically like mucus igloos that these colonies of organisms can live inside and be protected from some of these antimicrobial treatments. 11:06 Right, and it's important to note too, like we can't just do one and then the next and then the next, like we can't chase it. 11:12 It's like these have to be kind of taken all together at the same time, correct? 11:16 Are you ready to revolutionize your approach to diagnosing and healing complex chronic inflammatory illnesses in both adults and children? 11:25 The Lime Bites Symposium is your gateway to cutting edge education, groundbreaking research, and innovative therapeutic solutions. 11:32 Join us at Lime Bites Symposium. 11:36 at the Fort Lauderdale Marriott Pompano Beach Resort and Spa. 11:40 Lion Bites is the premier functional medicine conference on complex, chronic, infection-driven inflammatory illnesses. 11:48 This year's meeting is jam-packed with leading industry experts discussing lung COVID, mycotoxin illness, PANS Pandas, as well as Lyme and other vector-borne diseases. 11:58 This conference will arm you with the knowledge, clinical pearls, and practical solutions that you can implement immediately into your practice Monday 12:07 morning that will literally change your patient's lives and get them on their path to true healing. 12:12 So join us at Pompano Beach or virtually from anywhere. 12:15 Register now at LymeBytes.com. 12:18 That's L-Y-M-E-B-Y-T-E-S dot com. 12:24 Well, within the tolerance of the person, of course, and there's ways to enhance one's tolerance. 12:29 But yeah, it's pretty well known that if you treat with just a cell wall drug, that those organisms can go one inside the cell, 12:38 or they could go into a cyst form. 12:40 Or if you just treat with a cyst drug, then they can go back into the spirals. 12:44 And the literature bases actually not very controversial about this. 12:47 It's pretty clear that it's been shown over and over again. 12:51 Okay. 12:52 Well, thank you. 12:53 So how important do you think using a multidisciplinary approach is when treating Lyme disease? 13:00 I've learned over 25 years that it's really the only way with chronic Lyme. 13:06 Acute Lyme, you can be much more isolated in your approach. 13:09 With chronic Lyme, every system of the body can be affected. 13:14 Every organ, every metabolic activity can somehow be impacted by this, whether it's hormones or neurotransmitters or liver function or kidney function 13:26 or cardiac function. 13:27 So everything needs to be addressed. 13:30 And so a multidisciplinary approach is remarkably important. 13:35 We have to protect someone's gut. 13:36 We have to make sure that we have high enough doses to to address the infections. 13:41 We need to deal with the die-off that happens when we treat effectively and these organisms die and we create this big immune storm. 13:48 We have to be able to allow patients' bodies to detoxify through kidneys or through liver and stool and through sweat. 13:59 So we have to work at so many different levels. 14:01 We also have to protect people's tissues and we have to support people's tissues. 14:06 We have to support nerve sheaths. 14:09 and cell membranes. 14:10 And so there's so many different aspects to dealing with chronic infection that there's no way to do this without a multidisciplinary approach. 14:20 Right. 14:21 So that being said, what role would you say natural remedies or various herbal medicines play? 14:28 Well, the evidence base is very is very clear that many herbal medications, herbal remedies work against spirochetes and against some of these co-infections. 14:44 And we're getting more and more evidence all the time. 14:46 Some of your work, you've shown that combinations and blends of herbs can be remarkably effective. 14:53 The individual herbs, you have a pretty good sense of what doses we need, what we need to target, what aspects they're working on,
Balancing Symptom Relief and Root Cause 15:02 even the mechanisms of action. 15:04 When we start using blends and we're dealing with synergies of these different herbs, a lot of it becomes the clinical evidence base. 15:10 And really what we've all kind of learned who are in this field, we're learning what blends work. 15:18 and really through clinical experience. 15:20 It's the herbs work on their own for many people, but they're also used so effectively in conjunction with those pharmaceuticals that I described earlier, 15:31 that they allow us to get higher levels of penetration of these anti-infectives, that they work sometimes synergistically with the pharmaceuticals, 15:41 that most patients at the end of the day, if we're treating people for months and months on end, that it is hard to tolerate pharmaceutical antibiotics 15:51 for that long. 15:51 So we have to take breaks. 15:53 We have to sometimes do pulses. 15:55 We have to sometimes go through different clinical regimes. 16:00 And one of the ways to keep people at their best at the highest chance of actually accomplishing this killing process is with the use of herbal antimicrobials. 16:12 Now, herbs also are the mainstay of the other work. 16:18 that is absolutely necessary when we're talking about a multidisciplinary approach. 16:23 When we're doing lymphatic work or we're doing liver or kidney or other kinds of detox work or we're helping the nervous system. 16:30 Yes, there are pharmaceutical agents that can work on these as well, but it's really the herbal and some of these other natural products, 16:38 whether alone or in blends that have a great evidence base and are highly effective. 16:44 There's no way we could do what we do without probiotics. 16:47 We need bifidus, we need saccharomyces boulardii, we need acidophilus, we need acarmanzia, we need these other things in the probiotics that there's no 16:58 way that people can sustain such high levels of necessary antibiotics without the support. 17:05 Right. 17:06 So you've alluded to some of the systems that are important to be supporting and evaluating during treatment for Lyme. 17:13 What other symptoms or systems, and can you elaborate on what you've already said, like with the gut, right? 17:19 And with the microbiome and with the kidneys and the liver, like what systems of the body, in your opinion, need to be evaluated and supported during treatment? 17:31 Well, I mean, each person is obviously different. 17:33 And so you're reinventing the wheel with each patient, but there's obviously patterns that we come across, right? 17:40 So the gastrointestinal tract, the immune system, even nutritional absorption, which has to do partially with. 17:47 the gastrointestinal tract, but it also has to do with cellular nutrition. 17:51 We have to work on these organs of elimination. 17:54 We have to work on some of these endocrine organs. 17:57 We have to make sure that the pancreas is functioning well. 18:00 We have to make sure that the adrenal glands are not overstressed and releasing too much cortisol, which can also impact the immune system. 18:08 We need to make sure. 18:10 that the nervous system is supported. 18:13 We have to make sure that patients are emotionally supported as well. 18:18 And so every system of the body is involved here and every part of the body can go wrong. 18:25 All of the sensory organs, the eyes, the ears, smell, taste, all of these things. 18:31 The lymphatic system, which is both immune and detox is highly impacted. 18:37 The skin is highly impacted. 18:39 So our microbiome is one of the most important players when we're dealing with a chronic infection that needs chronic anti-infective. 18:48 So the musculoskeletal system, I didn't even allude to that yet. 18:54 And that's probably one of the largest, most impacted systems for all of the infections and for all of some of the side effects of the drugs as well. 19:01 We have to make sure that the tissues and the joints and the bones are all addressed. 19:08 The hematopoietic system, we have to make sure that the spleen and the liver and the kidneys again, and the blood itself is addressed. 19:19 Every system is involved. 19:20 It's amazing to me. 19:23 Yeah, when it has the ability to infect every single cell in the body, right, it's going to affect every single system. 19:29 I often find that whether it's a genetic weakness or previous injury or what have you, it's part of like why every patient's presentation is different 19:40 because somehow this organism knows how to go to that vulnerable weak spot in the patient. 19:47 It has, this organism is very complicated. 19:49 This spirochete is very complicated. 19:53 It's dumb cousin syphilis was complicated enough. 19:58 And this genome is so much more complicated with the plasma DNA, with the genomic DNA. 20:04 It's a survivor. 20:05 It's one of the older organisms on the planet and it knows how to survive. 20:10 It knows how to use our body against us. 20:13 It knows how to confuse. 20:15 and evade the immune system. 20:17 There's not a lot of organisms per in this infection. 20:21 When you talk about it in terms of bacterial terms, like one organism really packs a punch, but it also kind of evade the immune system. 20:28 You can live inside cells. 20:30 It doesn't like oxygen. 20:31 So it goes away from the bloodstream where most of the medicines go. 20:34 It's a survivor in every sense of the word. 20:39 So with that being said, and keeping in mind the treatments that we've talked about so far, are there alternative or adjunctive treatments that you recommend 20:50 to your patients or that you think are really helpful in helping to heal the patient from Lyme disease? 20:57 So I just wrote a book about this actually. 20:59 Uh, and so I talk about that a lot of those, and I think it's important also to, um, to describe the difference between adjunctive and alternative as well, 21:10 right? 21:10 Uh, adjunctive treatments are things that are supportive treatments. 21:14 There are things that you're going to do, uh, with your, your main focus. 21:19 You're working on, uh, on killing the organism. 21:23 You're also working on decreasing the inflammatory response. 21:27 You're often having to decrease a mast cell reaction and other forms of immune overreactivity. 21:34 Your immune system often overreacts because it's underperforming. 21:38 And so it's almost compensating for what it can't do right. 21:42 It's going to overcompensate in those places. 21:44 And so you have to address that. 21:46 Otherwise patients just can't sustain the treatment and you have to back off. 21:50 Adjunctive treatments include doing herbal and exercise herbal supports for kidneys and livers and, and exercise. 21:58 So people sweat or going into a sauna to, uh, to allow some of this, these other toxicants to get out of the body.
Personalized Testing and Diagnostics 22:05 And so adjunctive adjunctive treatments are really crucial in order to, to, to properly treat chronic infection. 22:16 Alternative treatments. 22:18 Some of the adjunctive treatments are alternative treatments, but when I think of alternative treatments, I think of really important and promising and 22:27 often very helpful treatments that maybe have an evidence base, but aren't really considered standards of care yet. 22:33 And that could be things like. 22:35 hyperbaric oxygen. 22:36 There's studies that show that it works against spirochetes, but it's still considered an alternative treatment. 22:41 Plasma exchange for rhesus or at plasma for rhesus. 22:44 It's a treatment, but it is still an alternative treatment in many ways. 22:48 Ozone is a treatment, different kinds of energy, energetic treatments and heat treatments. 22:55 All of these can be considered alternative treatments. 22:57 Many of them are very useful and have their place, even things like apiotherapy like B-venom therapy can be really helpful in its place, 23:06 but there are alternative treatments and often not necessarily the mainstay and definitely not the place that I would go first, 23:13 but they can be very supportive and they could be alternate. 23:16 Some of these alternative treatments could be an adjunct also to the mainstay of what we're trying to accomplish here with using the proper anti-infectives 23:26 that we know should work. 23:27 And we're learning more about more all the time. 23:29 There's new drugs on the horizon all the time and those are increasing our database. 23:36 And I also think that many of these alternative treatments are contributing to the database too, as more of us are using them. 23:43 I would imagine a lot of these alternative treatments that you're talking about too can oftentimes help to alleviate symptoms. 23:50 They might not be getting to the actual root cause, but can be effective in helping to decrease pain, for example, or increase energy. 24:01 On that note, can you talk a little bit about how you balance symptom management versus treating the underlying cause? 24:09 Are you suffering from Lyme disease or another complex chronic illness and aren't sure who to trust when it comes to herbal supplements? 24:16 Hi. 24:17 I'm Dr. 24:18 Mariah Hinchey, founder of Lyme Core Botanicals. 24:21 As a naturopathic physician specializing in complex, chronic, infection-driven illnesses like Lyme disease, I needed herbal medicine I could truly trust. 24:31 That's why I formulated Lyme Core Botanicals. 24:34 where our herbal tinctures are handcrafted in small batches right here in Connecticut. 24:39 We use the whole herb, never isolates, to preserve the full spectrum of medicinal compounds. 24:45 Every single step from sourcing to extraction is done with precision to ensure maximum purity, potency, and consistency. 24:55 These are the same herbal formulas I used to heal myself and have used for years to help my patients and family members heal, 25:02 too. 25:03 And now I'm making them available to practitioners and patients everywhere. 25:08 Lyme Core Botanicals, herbal medicine you can trust from a doctor who lives this work. 25:14 Learn more at Lyme Core Botanicals. 25:17 That's L-Y-M-E-C-O-R-E dot com. 25:25 Yes, I thank you. 25:27 I can, however, again, each person is different, right? 25:31 What I wrote in the book is really about an order of treatment. 25:35 In fact, the book's called The Order of Treatment. 25:37 And just to refer to it, you have to, in order to accomplish the goal of eradicating the infection, you have to decrease the patient's initial inflammatory 25:50 response in order for the treatments to work. 25:52 You can't, if someone who's already very inflamed, You can't increase their inflammation without giving them some relief. 25:59 So you have to stop that inflammatory cascade first. 26:04 I feel that you have to decrease that hyper reactive load and response, whether that means decreasing mast cells by using various antihistamines, 26:18 whether they're herbal or are pharmaceutical, but overall just decreasing that hyper reactivity that prevents you from getting anywhere. 26:28 So that's the first step. 26:29 And then I think that there's several different agents, both pharmaceutical and natural, that you need to allow the body to start receiving treatments, 26:38 whether you're using hormonal treatments to help that happen, like oxytocin, or you're using things like low dose naltrexone, 26:44 or you're using other things to just give the body a chance to start assimilating and tolerating many of the treatments that you're going to use. 26:55 Then you need to really make sure that the body is nutritionally supported. 27:00 The body has to be strong enough to be able to be going to battle. 27:04 And so whether that's using phospholipids like fats or B vitamins or uh, or amino acids or other electrolytes, the body needs to be nutritionally replete. 27:18 And then I think it also needs to be detoxed a bit because you can't have a huge toxic load when you're starting off with, 27:26 with these patients. 27:27 So, and whether detox means making sure that fungus is out of the way, making sure that you've addressed mold issues because these service patients are really, 27:36 many of them have chronic Lyme and mold. 27:39 exposure and mold sickness. 27:41 And you can't, for many of them, you can't go straight into heavy antimicrobial regimens without addressing the SERS, the systemic inflammatory response 27:52 that things like mold can cause for them. 27:54 And then there is the killing process. 27:56 And during that killing process, you need to make sure patients are safe. 27:59 You need to make sure that you're using things to keep their liver, kidneys and other organs Say if you need to make sure that drug interactions are measured, 28:08 you need to make sure that things like when you're using a drug, for example, rifampin, which we use often for Bartonella or lichia and anaplasma, 28:17 that we're monitoring their sex hormones and that they're getting repletion with the hormones that they need when some drugs and other treatments can decrease those. 28:27 And then, uh, I think we have to continue to, to allow the body to heal, to address the, the die-off reactions or Herck's reactions. 28:36 We need to help the body get stronger after we've done the killing process. 28:41 And even towards the end stages of the killing process, we have to teach the body or help the body heal again. 28:47 Um. 28:50 And so a lot of regenerative medicine is really coming into play here for the chronic Lyme patients. 28:55 Patients have been sick for, you know, some of them for 40 or 50 years and not knowing that they had Lyme. 29:01 And so there's going to be nerve damage. 29:03 There's going to be lots of fibrous tissue damage. 29:06 There's going to be all sorts of. 29:08 cognitive issues and we need to help the body learn to repair itself. 29:13 So things like exosomes and even some stem cells can be really useful there. 29:17 The phospholipids again can be used almost at all stages. 29:21 A lot of different peptides have been really useful for helping mitochondrial function, for working on immune support, even for some antimicrobial ones, 29:32 for pineal and hypothalamic support, there's many peptides that a lot of us are using in this field to work on this adjunct work, 29:42 and the evidence base is increasing for those too. 29:44 So it really depends on the person for how to address these really complicated I think that there's an order for when you're dealing with chronic infection 29:55 for how to approach them. 29:57 You have your antimicrobial piece, whether it's pharmaceutical or herbal or homeopathic, or there's other ways as well, or through modalities, 30:06 through pressure, through hyper oxygen, through heat, through other various remedies. 30:12 But then you also have the whole body that you have to address some of it, which has been devastated by the infection. 30:18 Some of it, which has, has been a response to the infection, like a hyper inflammatory and dysregulated auto, you know, dysregulated immune state. 30:27 Right. 30:28 Yeah, and if you don't recover the immune system as best as you can, it's like how is the body supposed to hold it into remission or eradicate it, 30:37 whatever the case may be. 30:38 I cannot believe, so we are at the point where the complimentary portion of this interview is coming to an end. 30:47 So Dr. 30:48 Harris, can you please let patients know how and where they can find you? 30:52 And again, tell us the name of your book, when it's going to be released, how we can get it. 30:57 And then we're going to dive deeper into, I have several more questions for you. 31:02 So I am working with Gordon Medical Associates in San Rafael and can be reached through Gordon Medical Associates as well as pacificfrontiermedical.com. 31:18 That's pacificfrontiermedical.com and the name of the book is The Order of Treatment and the website where it can be obtained or at least with a link to 31:30 how to get it is limetreatment2024.com. 31:32 So lymetreatment2024.com and it's The Order of Treatment is the name of the book. 31:48 And when does it come out? 31:48 It should be out by now. 31:50 Oh, great. 31:52 Wonderful. 31:52 All right. 31:53 Thank you. 31:54 Okay. 31:55 So let's dive back in and can you start by talking about how patients can personalize their treatment plan, not only to need their specific needs, 32:05 but also if there are co-infections involved. 32:08 And I mean, this could be a totally separate talk in and of itself. 32:13 So. 32:14 Right. 32:14 So we're talking again, we're talking about chronic Lyme here. 32:17 Acute's been dealt with, you know, with that sick somewhere between two and six weeks of treatment that that did the trick. 32:24 So these are the chronic patients who either weren't treated initially properly or didn't know that they had diagnosis. 32:31 And so really what you have to do, I think first is you need to look at the infections. 32:37 What infections are you dealing with? 32:40 And so I'll look at both do use direct tests as well as indirect tests. 32:46 I'm sure other speakers have discussed this. 32:49 Direct tests, you're looking for the organisms themselves. 32:52 Indirect tests, you're looking for antibodies or T cells or other secondary evidence that the infection is there. 33:00 So you're looking, I think it's important to look for the, for Lyme, for Borrelia infections and maybe even doing strain and species analysis. 33:13 So knowing if it's a European strain, knowing which European strain or species and, or knowing even which strain you're dealing with if it was from North America. 33:25 And then there's other strains and species throughout the rest of the world too. 33:28 So there might not always be overlap in the testing. 33:31 So depending on where someone's been bitten, that needs to be considered pretty significantly. 33:38 So, but at least doing testing through a reputable lab. 33:42 For with antibodies, I would at least do a Western blot or an immunoblot, something that has all of the bands, not just the ones that you see in New Line. 33:50 And then I would do a PCR or tests like PCR. 33:53 I would look for Bartonella infections. 33:55 I would look for Babesia infections. 33:57 You can do RNA testing on those as well as DNA testing, as well as antibody testing, as well as T cell testing. 34:06 I would look for Babesia, Bartonella, Ehrlichia, as well as Anaplasma. 34:11 Those are white blood cell infections. 34:13 They're usually easier to treat. 34:14 If you know that you have Lyme, you're usually treating them along the way, not necessarily. 34:19 And if it's a really classic case of Ehrlichia, that can be quite severe and then you need to treat with the appropriate treatment. 34:26 But I'm going to usually test for those as well. 34:29 I'm also going to look at viral. 34:32 Exposure, I'm going to look at, see if there's active infections for viruses. 34:35 Many of the usual suspects such as human herpes 6, such as herpes simplex 1 and 2, Epstein-Barr, Cucksacky viruses, Parvo viruses, 34:46 and others. 34:46 I'm going to look at probably a cytokine panel looking at someone's immune system. 34:51 I am often going to do the Bruce Patterson radiance lab test that IGENX actually does as well, looking at some of the cytokines that you see in chronic Lyme, 35:00 that you see in long COVID to see how inflamed their immune system is. 35:05 I'm going to do a nutritional analysis with one of several labs, whether it's Genova or Spectrocell or doctor's data, to take a look at nutrients, 35:16 sometimes with amino acids, fasting plasma amino acids. 35:20 I'm going to do an organic acid test in the urine and a stool test to look at the microbiome, whether I'm using GI map or Genova or doctor's data for those. 35:31 I'm going to perhaps do a Kennedy Krieger test on phospholipids, which body bio can interpret. 35:39 and look at people's ratio of fatty acids to see if they can become more replete with phosphatidylcholine. 35:46 Perhaps look at adrenal gland, adrenal function with a saliva test. 35:51 I'm definitely going to do first morning blood tests for cortisol for hormones as well, but I'm also going to do saliva and urine tests for those. 36:00 And there are several labs that I like us biotech and ZRT. 36:03 I may do food allergy testing. 36:05 I may do mass cell testing to, to evaluate. 36:09 I'm going to maybe look at heavy metals as well here. 36:13 And I'm definitely going to do. 36:15 some mold testing, whether I'm using something like real-time labs or another lab with a glutathione challenge to, to see a mycotoxin release. 36:24 It's not a perfect test, you know, and you have to use that in, in time and, and, and context, but I'll do that with. 36:31 like a shoemaker panel, which would be a TGF beta one and an MP9 looking at VIP and MSH. 36:37 And a lot of these markers, TGF beta one, C4A, a lot of these markers that you see when there's a lot of inflammation from either actinomyces or from mold. 36:47 I may do a genie panel, which is a specialized transcriptomics test for mold. 36:52 That's usually a secondary test that I'm going to do. 36:55 Um, and, uh, and then there's a whole host of other specific tests. 36:58 I mean, there's a bunch of mitochondrial tests. 37:00 There's some seahorse testing, which is actually just a research, uh, test now. 37:04 I'd love to do more metabolomics. 37:06 Metabolomics is the hot topic and how to do precision medicine. 37:11 It's looking at. 37:13 metabolites that you make. 37:15 So, and depending on the company, you can do hundreds to thousands of different metabolites. 37:21 And it's really where we need to go for precision medicine with the metabolomics, where we can also look at genomics and of course, 37:31 and we can look at transcriptomics and even a methylomics, which is methylation of the genes. 37:38 That's still not quite as accurate as some of the genomics and some of the other proteomics and things like that that we're testing, 37:45 but it's really promising because methylation we're finding is everything. 37:50 Some of our genes are going to show that we have propensity for disease, but it's only if those genes are actually on or off, 37:57 is that going to actually show if those genes actually matter to us.
Patient Advocacy and Hope 38:02 And so that's where methylation comes into play often. 38:05 And then I'm probably going to do other methylation panels. 38:08 I may do things that look at reducing oxidized glutathione and all of the precursors to that. 38:14 And so there's almost no end to the things that we can do looking at how well someone is functioning, whether it's from an infectious immune, 38:24 a mitochondrial and other energy-based and biome. 38:28 Yeah, and I didn't even say that, you know, doing your typical rheumatological panels and your typical IBS, you know, IBD panels and your CBCs and your 38:38 panels that are, your clotting coagulation panels can be remarkably useful and helpful and actionable. 38:46 And then there's the imaging process too, even though PET scans don't have the evidence base yet. 38:52 To give us the information we need, we can infer a lot from PET scans. 38:57 Spec scans are still the gold standard, but PET scans are very exciting, especially what tracer we were using in the PET scans. 39:06 So there's a lot of imaging that's very exciting. 39:09 All of this diagnostic information is what I think that you use for precision medicine. 39:16 There's a lot of options out there. 39:17 There's so many tests out there. 39:19 And I think, you know, for patients listening, there's so much to do and it can be overwhelming. 39:25 And I think this is why you really need to make sure that you have a practitioner that knows what they're doing and knows how to do a really, 39:33 really good history and practices functional medicine so that they can listen and determine. 39:40 like which of these tests are necessary in your particular case and helping to bring back balance and proper functioning into the body so that you have 39:52 the best chance. 39:53 What I think was one of the most important things that I don't know if it's going to come up in the rest of the summit, but the history that is so important, 40:04 the history and the physical exam actually both. 40:06 And so for the patients who are out there, you need a doctor who listens to you for long enough for you to be able to tell your whole story. 40:14 This takes time. 40:15 This is not easy. 40:16 And even on first pass, even on a two or three hour first visit. 40:21 You may not get all the information, but the history I think is so important because oftentimes you're not going to know it, 40:27 but you're going to tell that doctor what is wrong with you without knowing. 40:32 And then the physical exam, I think it's important, not every time, especially in the age of telehealth, but I think that first visit or the second visit, 40:41 a proper full physical exam, it still is very important. 40:46 There's very subtle but very important signs that we can find that will show us which infection, if any, you're likely dealing with. 40:55 Right. 40:55 Yeah. 40:56 And in addition to that too, like just the different physical findings that can point to certain nutrient deficiencies, right, 41:03 that you might not pick up otherwise too. 41:06 Yeah. 41:07 So history and physical exam, both very, very important. 41:10 Okay. 41:11 So what would be your one piece of advice that you would say to a patient who's sitting here listening to you, who just doesn't know where to start as 41:23 far as treatments go? 41:25 Besides, like we just said, finding someone who is a proficient practitioner. 41:30 Trust your own experience too. 41:33 Trust that what you are experiencing and feeling is real. 41:38 Because I think one of the biggest problems with chronic Lyme patients and why they come to us so late is that. 41:47 Their initial labs look great. 41:49 Their early Lyme tests or ELISA tests are very superficial peripheral Lyme tests. 41:55 If they'd even have them, they're negative. 41:57 And so don't give up and don't be told that this is all in your head.
Promising New Treatments 42:04 Um, and because the answers are out there, there's so many amazing practitioners and there's so many treatment approaches and modalities that can work 42:16 for you. 42:16 And don't, don't settle for, for just getting a little bit better because there's no reason why almost everybody can't get well and fully recovered. 42:28 Yeah, I believe that too. 42:29 If you truly feel like you're not being heard and like your concerns are not being taken seriously, find somebody that you have a good rapport with and 42:39 someone who is listening to you. 42:41 You have to believe that you're going to get better, to get better. 42:45 I agree. 42:46 I totally agree. 42:47 Absolutely. 42:48 And then the other thing at the end of the day is even if you don't believe that you're going to get better, hope that you'll get better. 42:55 So the hope is actually probably as important as everything else, because when there's hope, there's still light, you know, 43:02 and there's still possibility. 43:03 But when there's no hope. 43:05 It's really hard, even if the right treatment is, you know, is hitting you in the face, but if the right treatment is, you're not going to even necessarily 43:14 get better from it. 43:14 So the hope is, is all important in my opinion. 43:18 Any new promising treatments out there that you know about that you can share? 43:23 Well, there's several. 43:23 I think there's the Dapsone protocol, which is going to be talked about if it hasn't already. 43:29 Disulfiram is an exciting protocol. 43:31 These are both antimicrobials. 43:32 There's phage therapy. 43:34 Martha Clokey in the University of Leicester in England is doing some incredible work on phage therapy and phage diagnostics. 43:44 There's new antimicrobials that are coming out. 43:48 There's always new peptide research that's showing how well these things work. 43:53 There's a lot of very smart, very dedicated people working on this. 43:58 This infection and the whole chronic Lyme disease, it's changing, it's shifting the paradigm for how medicine in this day and age is thought about. 44:09 It is truly a paradigm changer. 44:12 And so when you have money and dedication and patients who are still not better, there's so much room for new knowledge and discoveries. 44:24 So it's a very exciting time. 44:26 The biggest problem is that the naysayers and the doctors and some of the academicians and some of the folks who don't believe that chronic infection or 44:37 even that chronic disease is really an issue. 44:41 And don't look at the interconnectedness of the body and the interrelatedness of all of our systems and how one aspect of the imbalance can affect so many 44:51 other parts of our body. 44:52 Yeah, it's amazing. 44:52 And I think once you actually understand the pathophysiology of the infection and what it does to every system of the body, 45:00 you can apply that to a lot of the chronic diseases that we deal with. 45:05 So It's just really, really eye-opening and hopefully more practitioners and researchers and, dare I say, politicians start paying attention and really 45:19 start taking this seriously and doing as much as we possibly can about it. 45:24 But for now, my mission, as I know one of yours is too, is just to try to get anyone and everyone to listen out there. 45:32 So thank you so much for joining us. 45:35 And it was a pleasure to interview you. 45:38 Thank you. 45:38 Thank you very much. 45:39 And we'll see all of you on our next edition.
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