Lyme disease is a little-known threat

The Shreveport Times - Shreveport LA
Bacterium-based and spread by ticks, Lyme disease affects the joints, heart and nervous system.

But local physicians are skeptical about whether it's found in northwest Louisiana, according to Lyme disease experts. The doctors generally don't consider the disease when its symptoms appear on patients, allowing it to infect many people and go undiagnosed and untreated.

"Not enough doctors know to test for it," said Pat Smith, president of Lyme Disease Association, a New Jersey-based nonprofit dedicated to research, education, prevention and patient support. "Not enough of the public know about it. They say, 'We don't have Lyme disease (in Louisiana).' They're just not thinking about it."

Louisiana had just 87 diagnosed cases from 1994 to 2003, according to the most recent figures available from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta. But that number is roughly 10 percent of the actual cases because CDC uses narrow and restrictive criteria for classifying Lyme disease cases, which serves to underscore its reach and impact, Smith said.

Dr. Jonathan Forester agrees and has anecdotal evidence to support it. Forester, who specializes in outpatient medicine, allergies and psychopharmacology, is treating about 300 patients with Lyme disease at his Pineville practice -- most of whom call Louisiana home.

"I'm truly alarmed by the number of people who have it. And it's not like I'm out there looking for it," he said. "I've reported my Lyme disease numbers here, but they will not count them at the state epidemiology department."

Jeannine Jalanivich is one of Forester's patients who knows firsthand about local doctors' skepticism regarding the disease.

About two years ago, the Mansfield woman experienced "stabbing" pains all over her body, constant fatigue and a low-grade fever that wouldn't go away. But it wasn't until she started losing her hair that she truly became alarmed.

"I thought I was crazy," the 29-year-old nurse said. "You have a lot of weird symptoms and no diagnosis of anything. 'What's going on with my body?' you start wondering."

Jalanivich remembered a lot of local doctors hesitating to point to Lyme disease because it has proved difficult to detect. Still, she added, Lyme disease is something the community, medical and otherwise, needs to follow closely.

"As years come, we're going to learn more about it," she said. "It makes sense that we have it here. Ticks travel on animals, and they're not localized to just one state."

While Jalanivich said she still experiences residual symptoms such as fatigue, the antibiotics and other medications she took for about six months have greatly improved her overall quality of life.

People with the disease need their physicians to identify it before they can properly treat it, Forester said, and Lyme disease needs more respect and attention for that to happen. "It needs more national recognition before we get more of a response."