Dalton RobertsOne thing wrong with writing on medical topics is that you can never cover a subject in one column, and you always get a lot of feedback from readers you feel you should share.
When I wrote last week on tick bites, I knew this would happen, but there has been such an increase in bites with serious consequences, well, I just felt I should warn people.
I got a half-dozen scary notes from people who had suffered severe consequences from bites. One was a horror story where a parent waded around in medical purgatory for six years before even getting a diagnosis.
In particular, I think I should share a letter from Mack McCord, who got so sick after a bite that he says, “I texted friends and relatives and told them I was going to die. I don’t even remember sending the text messages. I couldn’t even get out of bed.”
Strangely, these severe symptoms don’t always appear for two to three years when Lyme disease is in full bloom. It seems to depend on how well the early antibiotics work at the beginning of the disease cycle. But even if they work well, you may not have some of these symptoms for a couple of years.