According to an article from lymedisease.org, Dr. Raphael Stricker is slated to speak about the future of Lyme disease diagnostics at MyLymeData2018: Seeking Cures Together. This conference is intended primarily for patient education and to provide support to the patient community.
Lyme disease is an infectious illness caused by the Borrelia genus of bacteria. This infectious microbe is spread to humans from the bite from ticks of the Ixodes genus. Rate of infections increase from the period from May to September, when ticks are more active. Signs of localized infection can include a distinctive bull’s eye rash that may appear anywhere from three to 32 days after a bite from a tick. However, about anywhere from 25 to 50 percent of infected people do not get the rash, complicating diagnosis. More confusingly, blood tests often show up negative in early stages. People can also experience flu-like symptoms in early infection. If infection spreads, more severe symptoms, such as fever, fatigue, facial paralysis, neck stiffness, joint pain, and neurological problems. Lyme disease is notorious for its ability to imitate other diseases like MS, and it is challenging to identify through symptoms alone. Testing for the disease is also not always effective; Dr. Stricker says that conventional tests don’t recognize over half of patients with chronic Lyme disease symptoms. To learn more about Lyme disease, click here.
In addition, Stricker claims that better methods for testing exist, but they have yet to be evaluated by the Center for Disease Control (CDC). More in-depth testing methods are currently in development that could identify multiple species of Borrelia as well as other tick-borne infections.
Dr. Stricker is a research leader for the MyLymeData project, which was first started in 2015. This project is meant to monitor patients’ Lyme disease over an extended period of time and involves over 10,000 patients. Recently, researchers from Claremont McKenna Collega and UCLA both received grants to the tune of $800,000 in order to use data from the project for research. The funding was provided by the National Science Foundation.
The MyLymeData2018 conference will be held on April 7th, 2018 from 1-5pm at the San Ramon Community Center. The center is located at 12501 Alcosta Blvd., San Ramon, CA. To learn more about the conference and register for the event, click here.
