Willow's got Lyme disease

I'm sorry, Lori! Don't beat yourself up too hard. My mothers dog, Gizzy, got it and they immediately put her on antibiotics. She did have symptoms though as she was limping quite severely, which is why she had been taken in. That was her only symptom, and since they could find no cause for it, based on her risk factors they tested her and she was positive.

Would it make sense to retest to make sure the first test was accurate?

Yeah, I would do a retest......hope Willow will be ok.....

willowchow

She was tested for Lyme in November and was negative. 

Don't jump to conclusions before the test results are in!!  You may have gotten a false positive.

http://www.fda.gov/medbull/summer99/lyme.html

The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is concerned about the potential for misdiagnosis of Lyme disease based on the results of commonly marketed tests for detecting antibodies to Borrelia burgdorferi, the organism that causes Lyme disease. It is important that clinicians understand that a positive test result does not necessarily indicate current infection with B. burgdorferi, and a patient with active Lyme disease may have a negative test result.

The last site I quoted was a human site.  Here is a canine site:

http://www.peteducation.com/article.cfm?cls=2&cat=1556&articleid=458

Blood tests are available to assist in the diagnosis of Lyme disease.  The standard blood test detects antibodies made by the dog in response to infection with B. burgdorferi.  Because of the lack of sensitivity of the blood test, many dogs show positive test results, but are not actually infected with the disease.  Many animals are exposed to the organism, but fight the infection off on their own. These animals will have antibodies to B. burgdorferi but not have the disease.  In an endemic area, almost 90% of all dogs will have a positive antibody test, so a single positive result means very little.  As we mentioned earlier, only around 10% of the exposed dogs actually contract the infection.

Willow may merely be naturally immune to Lyme.

Don't do the antibiotics unless it's TRULY warranted.  You don't want to over-convince the body to respond.  It was a 'false positive' we got on Lyme/Ehrlichia 2 years ago which only showed his body had been exposed but was building anti-bodies -- when he went on the Doxycycline, his body over-revved immune-wise thinking it REALLY had to 'repel invaders' and generalized to his whole bloodstream = IMHA.

IN other words, we probably made the IMHA FAR worse than it would have been because of the addition of the drug. 

Is she anemic?  Billy was slightly anemic -- his hematacrit was 20.  But the vet didn't put him on the antibiotic until we got this "super light positive" tick test result -- if I recall the low border was 16 and his was like exactly 16 or something. We were happier to think "tick disease" than IMHA so started him on the antibiotics ... but the antibiotics triggered the immune system into over-drive and it just started killing ALL his red blood cells rather than just the ones with the antibodies in them. 

Let the vet get the full picture *first*.  Then decide.  The vet may need to verify if it IS a true positive or if it's just antibodies showing in the test.

As long as he was on the Doxy the body didn't respond to any of the IMHA treatments and I nearly lost him.   I had no way of knowing all this then ... I'm only telling you this out of sheer hind-sight. 

Today she had one of those 10 minute snap tests for Lyme and that's what was positive--she did the same in November and it was negative. 

I called the vet back before DH was concerned and she said she isn't going to rush to give her the Doxycycline(?sp) until she sees the full blood panel and urine.  If she's not showing symptoms and the blood/urine are OK I don't think she's going to put her on anything.  The other concern is that the antibiotic will probably flare up her IBS, which she's doing well with at the moment.

My DH is just concerned that if untreated the bacteria will just increase and cause more serious illness later.  Is this true? 

Thanks so much.  I'm so mad at myself, how ridiculous that I didn't get the vaccine when I could of. 

Lori

  Lori; I don't have any advice, but just want to say I'll be keeping Willow in my thoughts and hoping the other tests are negative. Please don't beat yourself up; I think the vet should have mentioned the vaccine when she was tested in November.

Thanks, Janice.  My husband is saying the same thing, why didn't she tell me to vaccinate her.  He's pretty upset but I know how proactive and informed you need to be with vets these days so I'm not surprised by stuff like this anymore. 

I find it strange that the vet didn't suggest it too. My experience is that they push this kind of stuff, even if you don't need it. You've caught it early though, so hopefully that's a plus and Willow will be just fine.

If it's a false positive because she was *exposed* to tick disease and her body created *antibodies* to it, then she's not really sick at all, and what may show up is simply the antibodies registering instead of actual disease cells.

This is a HARD shot to take -- Dum Dog recently did a thread on this and I explained there, that there are a lot of vets out there who don't like this shot (and thank GOODNESS for them!!!) -- it causes a lot of reactions, and specifically it's such a strong shot that it can actually *cause* the disease if the animal has been exposed and is 'fighting' it at the time of the shot (which you can't possibly know). 

A couple of years ago this was a topic at a U of FL Dog Owners and Breeders Symposium I went to -- essentially they don't tend to vaccinate dogs that aren't high risk and they don't vaccinate dogs that may already have been exposied and may have formed their own immunity (which is far better).

It's a high risk shot, and Willow's IBD issues make her not a great candidate for the shot. 

IF she has tick disease (and the vet may need to do a bigger tick panel to determine this -- and **bravo** to your vet for not wanting to expose her to unneeded vaccines and unneeded antibiotics), then when she comes out of it on the other side she will have her own immunity.

What I said above about the risks of stuff like vaccinosis and IMHA and even antibiotics *causing* IMHA is a HUGE deal.  It's not one that a lot of vets take seriously, but my guess is that your vet is well acquainted with Willow's health issues and is respectful of them. 

The course of treatment for tick disease can be ***months*** -- literally months on this big huge mega nasty antibiotics.  You do *not* want to rush this -- you don't want to treat needlessly for this.  Billy is walking proof of that.

 The other thing to mention is this -- there are MANY varieties of tick disease.  It's not ALL Lyme Disease.  There is Lyme, Ehrlichia, Spotted Tick, Rocky Mt., and OTHERS (many many many ***many*** others).  You only see the vax for Lyme.  But it could be another tick disease (and there may not be a vax for it). 

About the only thing they have in common is some mild anemia (and some of them have severe anemia).  But it runs the gamut of 100 different symptoms.

OH, NO........my dogs never got vaccinated........the vet never even suggested it.........

Calliecrittur's advice is stupendous, the only thing I can add to it is a lot of crossed fingers and paws down here in SW VA for Willow!!! Lyme is such a tricky, tricky thing :(

OK, first, thanks for all the advice and good wishes for Willow.

If anyone can answer--and I apologize if it's already been answered and I'm just not catching on--I should be asking for bloodwork to specifically show if she has any type of antibiodies AND what type of tick disease she has. 

Also, if she is positive and we leave her "untreated"--I understand there are very real risks to treating her--what will happen with this bacteria--will it get worse, will she start showing symptoms later on?  I don't want to be all of a sudden blindsided by a very sick dog one day. 

Thanks, this is so helpful.

Lori